Lili Damita was born Liliane Marie Madeleine Carré on July 10, 1904, in Blaye, France. As a child she studied ballet and attended school in several different countries, including France, Portugal and Spain. She enrolled at the Opera de Paris and by the age of sixteen was working as a professional model and dancer. In 1921 she won a beauty contest and was offered her first acting role. She appeared in the Casino de Paris and starred in about a half dozen French films.Then she met Mihály Kertész
In 1928 she was brought to Hollywood by Samuel Goldwyn, she appeared in films with leading men such as Cary Grant, Gary Cooper, James Cagney and Maurice Chevalier.
As her film career was beginning to wind down, she met Errol Flynn, for the first time in Paris apparently, then more famously on the SS Paris, on Errol’s first trip to America. Lili fell for Errol and used her connections in Hollywood to get him a chance at Captain Blood, which her old fling, now known as Michael Curtiz, waa directing. The rest is history.
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— Tim
The Real Person!
July 11, 2020 at 11:20 am
I find it interesting that two of the women who were important in Flynn’s life were both Cancerians. I speak of course of Miss De Havilland who was also born under the sign of the crab. It’s also interesting that Lili according to the author Alan K. Rode was a lover of her director. Of course he does state that there is no proof that they were ever married as some sources on the internet have claimed. But this then poses another reason for the animosity between Errol and the director. Unless they kept their past history from Errol which may be why it was not mentioned in his autobiography.–A. R.