With prominent cheekbones and the most appealing overbite of her day, Gene Tierney striking good looks helped propel her to stardom.
Tierney's best roles include the hauntingly beautiful murder victim in the noir classic "Laura" (1944); the neurotically possessive bride in John M. Stahl's 1945 melodrama "Leave Her to Heaven" (for which she received her only Oscar nomination); and the serene widow in Mankiewicz's outstanding romantic fantasy "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir" (1947). Other notable successes during the 40s were Heaven Can Wait (1943), and the superb The Razor's Edge (1946).
Divorced from designer Oleg Cassini in 1952, Tierney had a number of romances, two of the more prominent were with Aly Khan and John F. Kennedy, the later telling her he could never marry her because of his political ambitions.
Her screen success continued into the early 1950s but her increasingly fragile mental health, brought on by her divorce, failed love affairs and the health of a handicapped child from her first marriage resulted in hospitalization and shock treatment for depression.
She was promptly suspended by Fox and did not return to acting until "Advise and Consent" in 1962.
In 1960 Tierney had married Texas oilman W. Howard Lee, former husband of Hedy Lamarr. Tierney died in 1971, her addiction to cigarettes (she originally started smoking to lower her voice) caused the emphysema that killed her.