Below are links to a pair of newspaper stories (one from London, the other from Baltimore) covering the death of a minor actress who worked at Hal Roach Studios in the early 1930s. Her screen name was Dorothy Layton. I cannot recall that she ever had much more than a line or two of dialogue in any film. Being so attractive, generally all she was required to do was to dress up any set she walked onto, or to look startled, as she performed quite well in ON THE LOOSE. But she did have to speak her name when she appeared as a bathing beauty contestant for an outstanding Charley Chase film which I saw initially in the late 1960s, and that was how I first identified her for several early filmographies. Otherwise no one would have the credits disclosed in these obits. That particular Chase film was YOUNG IRONSIDES, and her only line is, "Dorothy Layton...San Francisco." She was never billed in anything. Unfortunately too few fans knew she had lived this long or where she was, and therefore no one ever did a serious interview with the aspiring actress, at least none that was published. Not that I know of anyway. However I would love to be proven wrong about this! Now we have an excuse -- if one is needed -- to take the time and screen again the various Hal Roach comedies in which she appeared. In what may be her biggest role, TAXI FOR TWO (see accompanying photo), Dorothy Layton and Joe Young (older brother of long time movie and Emmy Award-winning TV star Robert Young) play a couple trying to elope in the middle of the night.
-- Richard W. Bann --