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  Dorothy
Flood was born on September 10,1912, in Brooklyn, New York and attended Children's Professional School in New
York. Early on, she was a ballet dancer with The Metropolitan Opera
Company.
She became a Ziegfeld Girl and was in the
Ziegfeld Follies of 1931. After her Ziegfeld career ended, she did modeling
jobs, including for Dobbs Hats and Whitman's Chocolates.
Other career highlights include:
-
In the musicals Hot-Cha!, Ziegfeld
Follies of 1931 and Midnight Frolic, and Smiles
-
one film,
Resurrection
(1931), playing Princess Hasan
-
dancing with Racine in Swan Lake as the
Black Swan (understudy)―she was chosen for her wonderfully expressive
hand movements
-
ballerina in Ziegfeld's production
of Whoopee!, and serving as understudy for
Ruby Keeler (going on for
her when Ms. Keeler was injured). Apparently, Dorothy was asked to
go to Hollywood to be in the movie version, but her parents wouldn't
allow it.
She was also in a show with
Maurice
Chevalier when he sang in the Rainbow Room.
She
and
Bing Crosby used to drink tea backstage together at rest breaks
during a show they were doing together. Dorothy counted among her many friends
Buddy Ebsen (whom she had worked with in
Whoopee!) and his sister
Vilma.
She was in a few
Marx Brothers
movies (but
said her scenes usually ended up on the cutting room floor!). During her later years, she lived happily as
a housewife on 5th Avenue in Manhattan.
Dorothy married Edward E. Bates, on December
31, 1940 in Greenwich, Connecticut and had a daughter in 1952.
Dorothy died on August 21, 2005 in Jupiter, Florida.
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