Ruby Dandridge

Ruby Dandridge (1 March 1899 in Wichita, Kansas – 17 October, 1987 in Los Angeles, California), born Ruby Jean Butler, was an African American actress from the early 1900s to the 1950s. She is best known for her radio work in her early days of acting.

Her parents were Nellie Simon and George Butler. It is stated in her daughter, Dorothy Dandridge's book (written by Earl Mills) that Ruby had mixed Jamaican, Mexican, and Native American ancestry. Her father was a janitor, minister, school principal, and entertainer, who inspired her to go into acting when she was young.

On 30 September, 1919 Ruby married Cyrus Dandridge. She moved with her husband to Cleveland, Ohio, where her daughter, actress Vivian Dandridge was born in 1921. A second daughter, Academy Award-nominated actress Dorothy Dandridge, was born there the following year, in 1922, five months after Ruby and Cyril divorced. It is noted that after her divorce, Ruby Dandridge had a relationship with a woman named Geneva Williams who overworked the two children and punished them harshly.Fact|date=August 2007

Ruby Dandridge is best known for her role on the radio show "Amos 'n Andy", in which she played Sadie Blake and Harriet Crawford, and radio's Judy Canova Show, in which she played the role of Geranium. She is also recognized for her role in the 1959 movie "A Hole in the Head", in which she played Sally.

She attended Dorothy Dandridge's funeral in 1965. [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0424049/] After Dorothy died, she went into seclusionFact|date=August 2007

She died of a heart attack at the age of eighty-eight in Los Angeles, California, and is buried next to her daughter Dorothy at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California.

In the 1998 flim, Introducing Dorothy Dandridge she is potrayed by Loretta Devine

Filmography

Features:
*"Midnight Shadow" (1939)
*"Broken Strings" (1940)
*"The Night Before the Divorce" (1942)
*"Gallant Lady" (1942)
*"Tish" (1942)
*"A Night for Crime" (1943)
*"Corregidor" (1943)
*"Cabin in the Sky" (1943)
*"Melody Parade" (1943)
*"I Dood It" (1943)
*"Never a Dull Moment" (1943)
*"Hat Check Honey" (1944)
*"Ladies of Washington" (1944)
*"Carolina Blues" (1944)
*"Can't Help Singing" (1944)
*"The Clock" (1945)
*"Junior Miss" (1945)
*"Saratoga Trunk" (1945)
*"Inside Job" (1946)
*"Three Little Girls in Blue" (1946)
*"Home in Oklahoma" (1946)
*"Dead Reckoning" (1947)
*"The Arnelo Affair" (1947)
*"My Wild Irish Rose" (1947)
*"Tap Roots" (1948)
*"Father Is a Bachelor" (1950)
*"A Hole in the Head" (1959)Short Subjects:
*"Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs" (1943) (voice)
*"Goldilocks and the Jivin' Bears" (1944) (voice)
*"Screen Snapshots: The Judy Canova Show" (1946)
*"Silly Billie" (1948)

Television:
*"Beulah (series) (1950-1953)

External links

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