18. Thelma Todd’s death was believed to have been a murder, though it was deemed a suicide
Although even the most avid movie fan today is likely unaware of Thelma Todd, the actress appeared in more than seventy films, performing with luminaries including the Marx Brothers, Buster Keaton, and Laurel and Hardy. During her acting career, she also became well-known to the authorities, being involved in numerous automobile accidents, to the point that her studio bosses provided her with a chauffeur and insisted that she use him. Both her marriages became tabloid fodder as a result of her physical and alcohol-fueled public brawls with her husbands. She also became involved with gangsters, investing in restaurants which became money laundering activities for the likes of Lucky Luciano.
In 1935 she was found dead at the wheel of her Lincoln automobile, an event which the amiable LAPD agreed to treat as a suicide after being so urged by Luciano and others. Widespread press reports speculated that she had been murdered, fed by the fact that her car was parked in an area thick with sticky mud, though her shoes were clean. This gave the lie to the LAPD theory that she had exited the car to insert a hose into the exhaust pipe, the other end feeding into the cabin in which she died from carbon monoxide inhalation. Luciano was the prime suspect of many, and following her death, he assumed control of her restaurant, an event she had once told him, before witnesses, would occur only over her “dead body”. “That can be arranged”, Lucky reportedly replied. She was 30 years old.
Where do we find this stuff? Here are our sources:
“Talullah: My Autobiography”. Talullah Bankhead. 1952
“Fatty Arbuckle and Hollywood’s First Scandal”. Jude Sheeran, BBC News. September 4, 2011
“Olive Thomas: The Life and Death of a Silent Film Beauty”. Michelle Vogel. 2007
“William Desmond Taylor: The Unsolved Murder”. Dina Di Mambro, Classic Hollywood Bios. Online
“Pilot ‘Distraught’ that Morrow Never Looked Up”. Paul Feldman, Los Angeles Times. March 25, 1987
“When Congress Slut-Shamed Ingrid Bergman”. Marlow Stern, The Daily Beast. November 21, 2015
“Bad Boys: The Actors of Film Noir”. Karen Burroughs Hannsberry. 2003
“American Gigolo”. Richard Babcock, Chicago Magazine. April 2008
“The Black Dahlia”. History, FBI.gov. Online
“Gloria and Joe: The Star-Crossed Love Affair of Gloria Swanson and Joe Kennedy”. Axel Madsen. 1988
“Platinum Girl: The Life and Legends of Jean Harlow”. Eve Golden. 1991
Medium – Hollywood’s Golden Age Era Of Secretly Bisexual, Homosexual And Lesbian Stars
Alabama Public Radio – Tallulah! The Life and Times of a Leading Lady
SFGate – The Death Of An Actress In San Francisco. What Happened In Room 1219?
Timeline – The Mysterious Death Of ‘The Most Beautiful Woman On Earth’
Medium – The Death of William Desmond Taylor
Factinate – Dramatic Facts About Gloria Swanson, Hollywood’s Iconic Diva