Maria Montez

Born in Barahona, Dominican Republic, Maria Africa Antonia Gracia Vidal de Santo Silas was one of several sisters, all of whom being blessed with an almost unreal, exotic beauty. But Maria had something more - an intense ambition which helped her leave her native land and, in the late-1930s, become a successful fashion model in New York City before landing a movie contract with Universal Studios in 1941. As was procedure at the time, she was forced to change her name to a more Anglicized version, choosing the surname "Montez" in honor of the famous dancer Lola Montes. Although she was not a gifted technical actress, Montez proved hugely charismatic and cut a gorgeous, game-for-anything onscreen figure for the studio, which, now that Deanna Durbin was growing out of her ingénue fame, was in desperate need of a franchise hit or a dependable box office star. In the wake of the Great Depression and as a world war loomed on the horizon, audiences were eager for glossy escapism, and in a string of campy over-the-top adventures, the exotic Montez struck a seemingly overnight chord with filmgoers, despite a stunning lack of acting skills.Starting her screen career with small roles in deliciously lurid fare like "The Invisible Woman" (1940), "Lucky Devils" (1941) and "That Night in Rio" (1941), Montez worked her way up to bigger roles in "South of Tahiti" (1941) and "Bombay Clipper" (1942) before scoring her first starring role, in the escapist showcase "Arabian Nights" (1942) as the famous storyteller Scheherazade. Universal had finally hit upon a formula that proved popular throughout the war years and which no other studio could lay claim to - the exotic Latin bombshell Maria Montez, clad in a silk sarong and donning an elaborate headpiece, waits for her beefcake hero - usually contract players Jon Hall or Turhan Bey, depending on the film - to save her from some bizarrely unique peril in a far off land or time. Montez's sullen dark beauty and cheerfully robust nature overshadowed any lack of stagecraft, and she scored again and again at the box office with cheap-but-colorful low-budget fare like her biggest hits "White Savage" (1943), "Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves" (1944), "Gypsy Wildcat" (1944) and "Sudan" (1945). While highbrow critics begged to differ, fans saw Montez reach the high point of her career in the so-bad-it's-good actioner "Cobra Woman" (1944), in which she essayed twin queens of a South Seas island - the "good" sister and an "evil" sister, dripping in jewels and deadly intrigue.So completely was Montez identified with these pulpy, garish adventures films that she became known as "The Queen of Technicolor" and "The Caribbean Cyclone." Taking a break from Bey and Hall, she starred opposite Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. in "The Exile" (1947). In real life, the actress married French actor Jean-Pierre Aumont, who left days after their wedding to serve in the Free French Forces fighting against Nazi Germany. Her reign as the best-natured sex kitten in B-movies came to an end, however, with the end of WWII and the resulting change in popular tastes, with films leaving behind escapist fare for a dark, more realistic view of the world.In 1948, Aumont and Montez moved their family to Europe, where she made a handful of films, including "Siren of Atlantis" (1949), "The Thief of Venice" (1950) and "Revenge of the Pirates" (1951). One of the few sex symbols to find personal happiness and assimilate comfortably out of the spotlight, Montez began writing books and poetry to keep herself busy. The world was shocked to hear the 39-year-old actress had died prematurely in Suresnes, France on Sept. 7, 1951 after apparently suffering a heart attack and drowning in her scalding hot saline bath. Aumont was inconsolable and pictures of him sobbing at her grave were wired around the world. To celebrate her life, her hometown named a street in her honor, and in 1996 - 45 years after her sudden, tragic death - opened the Maria Montez International Airport. Although she never appeared in mainstream classic fare like peers Lana Turner, Rita Hayworth and Betty Grable, Maria Montez left behind a vibrant legacy as one of Hollywood's all-time greatest and most glamorous guilty pleasures.By Jonathan Riggs