Jennie Lee (actress)

Jennie Lee
Still from The Old Chemist (1915) with Jennie Lee (in blackface) and Frank Bennett
Born	September 4, 1848 Sacramento, California
Died	August 5, 1925 (aged 76) Hollywood, California
Years active	1912-1924

Jennie Lee (née Mary Jane Lee; September 4, 1848 – August 5, 1925) was an American actress of the silent film era.

Jennie Lee appeared in 58 films between 1912 and 1924, working especially in character parts under the directors John Ford and D. W. Griffith. She began her stage career at age nine and went on to support such actors as John Edward McCullough, Joseph Jefferson, Edwin Booth, and Helena Modjeska.^[1] She and her husband, actor William Courtright, appeared together in Griffith's Intolerance (1916). Incontestably, Lee's most famous portrayal was that of servant Mammy in The Birth of a Nation (1915), a role she played in blackface.

Selected filmography

• The Mothering Heart (Griffith, 1913)
• The Sorrowful Shore (Griffith, 1913)
• Two Men of the Desert (Griffith, 1913)
• The Battle at Elderbush Gulch (Griffith, 1913)
• Judith of Bethulia (Griffith, 1913)
• Brute Force (Griffith, 1914)
• The Birth of a Nation (Griffith, 1915)
• The Slave Girl (Browning, 1915)
• An Innocent Magdalene (Dwan, 1916)
• The Children Pay (Ingraham, 1916)
• Nina, the Flower Girl (Ingraham, 1917)
• Stage Struck (Morrissey, 1917)
• Souls Triumphant (O'Brien, 1917)
• Riders of Vengeance (Ford, 1919)
• Bill Henry (Storm, 1919)
• Rider of the Law (Ford, 1919)
• The Big Punch (Ford, 1921)
• North of Hudson Bay (Ford, 1923)
• Hearts of Oak (Ford, 1924)

Resources

1. Motion Picture Studio Directory, 1921, p. 146

External links

• Jennie Lee at the Internet Movie Database
• Jennie Lee at the Internet Broadway Database