Muriel Steinbeck Explained

Muriel Myee Steinbeck
Birth Place:Broken Hill, New South Wales, Australia
Birth Date: 21 July 1913
Death Place:Orange, New South Wales, Australia
Occupation:Actress, drama school proprietor and tutor

Muriel Myee Steinbeck[1] (21 July 1913 – 20 July 1982) was an Australian actress who worked extensively in radio, theatre, television and film. She is best known for her film performance portraying the wife of aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith in Smithy (1946) and for playing the lead role in Autumn Affair (1958–59), Australia's first television soap opera.

Filmink magazine later said "Steinbeck’s appeal was a little like that of Greer Garson in Hollywood – a regal, lady-like figure. That’s an over-simplification – she played all sorts of roles – but she was, overall, a classy dame. Her beauty meant that her photo often appeared in trade publications and she was particularly popular on radio soaps and at the Minerva Theatre in Sydney."[2]

Biography

Early life

Steinbeck was born the youngest four children of William Martin Steinbeck and Lily Clarissa (née Batten), in Broken Hill, New South Wales, where her father was working as a headmaster. Her family left Broken Hill when Muriel was five.

She was educated at Newcastle and Sydney Girls High (1926–1930), where taking an interest in acting she often appeared in school plays, when the family moved to Sydney she became involved in amateur theatre, appearing in plays particular Shakespeare such as The Merchant of Venice and A Midsummer Night's Dream and becoming renowned for her performances in comedy and drama.[3]

She was appearing in a production of Where the Crash Comes when she was spotted by Lawrence H. Cecil of the ABC. He hired her to do radio drama and her career was launched.[4] Her first radio play was The Silver Cord and her first serial lead was The Three Diggers (1938). She was later briefly under contract to James Raglan while he was producing at Colombia where she starred in Soldier of Fortune.[5]

Steinbeck began appearing on the stage regularly at the Minerva Theatre in Kings Cross. She was in such productions as Spring Tide (1941), Claudia (play) (1942), Watch on the Rhine (play) (1942), Janie (1943), and The Amazing Dr Clitterhouse (1943).

Films

Steinbeck made her film debut in wartime propaganda short, Eleventh Hour (1942), directed by Ken G. Hall. Hall then used her in another short, South West Pacific (1943).

Steinbeck made her feature film debut in A Son Is Born (1946), a melodrama where she played the lead role, a woman who marries unhappily (to Peter Finch), and has an ungrateful son (played by Ron Randell). According to Filmink "this is a perfectly fine soapie, with Steinbeck suffering and smiling through the tears. She has beauty and charisma and holds her own against three men who would all become major names."[2]

Its release was delayed to take advantage of publicity for her second film, Smithy, directed by Hall, a biopic of Charles Kingsford Smith (played by Randell) where Steinbeck played his wife.[6] The film was a big commercial success but Australia made so few films at the time Steinbeck focused on radio and theatre work. (Steinbeck later said the success of the film hurt her theatre career for a while as producers assumed she would be too expensive to hire.[7]) According to Filmink "Steinbeck might have considered going overseas herself – many female actors did so at the time, like Mary Maguire, Jocelyn Howarth and Shirley Ann Richards... But Steinbeck elected to stay home – she had a daughter, and her marriage was breaking up, and it was probably a bad time to rock the boat. Besides, in the late forties she had plenty of work on radio and stage. Such was her profile, she even endorsed chocolate and lipstick. "[2]

Inbetween film engagements, she continued to work in theatre, appearing in Dangerous Corner (1946), The Third Visitor (1946), Clutterbuck (1947), and I Have Been Here Before (1948).

Steinbeck had a role in horse racing melodrama Into the Straight in 1949 and another biopic Wherever She Goes in 1951. playing the mother of Eileen Joyce. Filming argued"The filmmakers would have been better off building the movie around Steinbeck... but then, Australian cinema has traditionally demonstrated a poor understanding of how best to exploit potential stars

She was in the film Long John Silver in 1954 and the TV serial The Adventures of Long John Silver in 1954 playing the wife of the governor.

Radio

She appeared in numerous radio serials in the 1950s including Blue Hills, Portia Faces Life and Gabrielle.[8] [9] One of her co-stars Bruce Stewart later recalled "she was a bit in the business of descending from on high."[10]

Television

Steinbeck starred in Australia's first TV soap opera, Autumn Affair (1958). In the words of Filmink "Steinbeck played Julia Parrish, middle aged widowed mother who wrote popular novels and had a busy private life. She laughed, loved and suffered with jolly good decency – the quintessential Muriel Steinbeck part."[2]

She was in two one-off TV dramas, Reflections in Dark Glasses (1960) and Thunder on Sycamore Street (1961) and had a recurring role in a serial, Stormy Petrel (1960). Relfections was a vehicle for her.[11]

In 1961 she was in Merchant of Venice at the Elizabethan Theatre Trust.[12]

From 1963 she was a regular member of the ABC's program 'English for New Australians' and she compared Woman's World.

She was in Heartbreak House (1964) at the Old Tote.[13]

Her final film role was in They're a Weird Mob (1966) playing the wife of Chips Rafferty.

Personal life

She was married to her first husband, a journalist, from 7 July 1934 until their divorce in 1949. They had a daughter, Janice Claire born in 1939.[14]

Steinbeck then married company manager and engineer Brian Dudley Nicholson in 1951.

Steinbeck lost a brother and a cousin during World War II; her brother was a POW and died in 1945, while her cousin was reported dead in 1944.[15]

Although she retired from acting in 1966, she accompanied her husband to Orange, New South Wales, to become a teacher of the arts, running her own drama school and authoring a book titled On Stage: A Practical Guide To the Actor's Craft.[16]

She died of cancer on 20 July 1982, aged 68.

Filmography

YearTitleRoleNotes
1942The Eleventh Hourshort
1943South West Pacific The Munitions Worker (Gwennie) Short
GrumblensMrs Grumblensshort
1944Australia Is Like This Documentary
1946Smithy Lady M. Kingsford Smith
1946A Son Is Born Laurette Graham
1949Into the Straight Laura Curzon
1954Wherever She Goes Mrs. Joyce
1954Long John Silver Lady Strong
1958Autumn Affair Julia Parrish TV series, 156 episodes
1960Reflections in Dark Glasses Episode of Shell Presents series
1960Stormy PetrelMrs Blightmini-series
1966They're a Weird Mob Mrs. Kelly (final film role)

Radio

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Muriel Myee Steinbeck . adb . 2012 . 16 February 2015 . Sally O,Neil.
  2. Unsung Aussie Actors – Muriel Steinbeck. Stephen. Filmink. Vagg. August 25, 2019.
  3. News: Film Chance for Clever Sydney Girl . . CLVIII . 5,018 . Victoria, Australia . 3 March 1945 . 29 September 2019 . 9 . National Library of Australia.
  4. News: Film Lead for Girl From Barrier . . 44 . 6,719 . Adelaide . 10 February 1945 . 30 April 2018 . 3 . National Library of Australia.
  5. Book: Phil, Peter. 208. Eureka Media. Drama in Silent Rooms: A History of Radio Drama in Australia from the 1920s to the 1970s.
  6. News: Star hit as Smithy's wife . . LXIV . 22,103 . Western Australia . 9 February 1946 . 30 April 2018 . 27 (First Edition) . National Library of Australia.
  7. Web site: Australian National University. The History of an Australian Film Production Company: Cinesound, 1932-70. Andrew Franklin. Pike. 197.
  8. News: Muriel Steinbeck to Star in "Smithy". . . Brisbane . 9 February 1945 . 18 April 2014 . 4 . National Library of Australia.
  9. News: Film Lead for Girl From Barrier. . . Adelaide . 10 February 1945 . 18 April 2014 . 3 . National Library of Australia.
  10. Philp p 243
  11. Forgotten Australian TV Plays: Reflections in Dark Glasses. Filmink. Stephen. Vagg. March 20, 2021. August 2, 2024.
  12. News: Ambitious production opens tonight in city . . New South Wales, Australia . 9 August 1961 . 30 April 2018 . 5 . National Library of Australia.
  13. News: AT SYDNEY THEATRES . . 36 . New South Wales, Australia . 4 September 1964 . 30 April 2018 . 5 . National Library of Australia.
  14. News: Muriel Steinbeck Divorced . . 10 September 1949 . 18 April 2014 . 5 . National Library of Australia.
  15. News: Film Chance for Clever Sydney Girl . . CLVIII . 5,018 . Victoria, Australia . 3 March 1945 . 24 March 2024 . 9 . National Library of Australia.
  16. News: Contentment is a Quarry . . 36 . 37 . 12 February 1969 . 30 April 2018 . 17 . National Library of Australia.