Mabel Withee

Mabel Withee (c. 1897 – November 3, 1952) was an American actress on stage and in silent film.

Mabel Withee
Mabel Withee, from a 1919 publication
Mabel Withee, from a 1919 publication
Bornc. 1897
DiedNovember 3, 1952 (aged 54-55)
Bayside, Queens, New York City, U.S.
OccupationActress
Spouses
Herman Leon Sarshik
(m. 1926; ann. 1928)
Larry Puck
(m. 1928)
Children1

Early life

Withee was born in Detroit, Michigan, the daughter of Leonard Withee.[1]

Career

Lester Allen, Mabel Withee, and George White, from Scandals of 1919.

Withee's Broadway appearances were mainly in musical comedies and revues, including roles in Sinbad (1918-1919, with Al Jolson and Kitty Doner),[2] George White's Scandals (1919), Just a Minute (1919), The Rose Girl (1921, the first show at the Ambassador Theatre),[3] Sonny (1921), The Rose of Stanboul (1922),[4] The World We Live In (1922-1923), Lady Butterfly (1923), Dew Drop Inn (1923), Artists and Models (1924-1925), The Cocoanuts (1925-1926, with the Marx Brothers).[5][6] She also starred in Mary Ann (1927) on vaudeville.[7][8]

She acted in one silent film, Once to Every Man (1918).[9]

Theatre critic George Jean Nathan considered Withee to have "the most beautiful legs in the world".[10] She retired from show business in 1928, when she married her second husband.[11]

Personal life

Withee was "wooed" by Egyptian prince Mohammed Ali Ibrahim in 1922, but rejected his proposal of marriage.[12] She married real estate broker Herman Leon Sarshik in 1926.[1] She asked for the marriage to be annulled on the basis of fraud in 1928.[13] She married again, to producer Larry Puck, later that year, and through him was the sister-in-law of actress Eva Puck. She had one son, Emmett Puck. She died in 1952, in her mid-fifties, in Bayside, Queens.[11][14]

References