Catherine Dale Owen

Lean, fair-haired Catherine Dale Owen, acclaimed as one of the world's ten most beautiful women of 1925, had the dubious distinction of co-starring in the film which did most to ruin John Gilbert's career in talking pictures. For most of the players concerned, His Glorious Night (1929) was anything, but. Provoking first giggles, then raucous laughter from the audience, Gilbert's excessively passionate declarations of love came out sounding high-pitched (either due to a problem with his voice or the sound recording of the time) and became all-the-more ridiculous, as they were delivered to Owen's icily phlegmatic Princess Orsolini (though the New York Times described her performance as 'captivatingly aloof'). In combination with the over-the-top dialogue (by Willard Mack), the total effect was comical rather than romantic.