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This lively and attractive actress was likely better known for her off-screen escapades than her solid "B" movie roles as a light comedienne in films of the 1930s and 1940s. Nevertheless, Arline Judge brought charm and vivacity to many films with her blue-eyed, brunette looks and vibrant portrayals. Her eight marriages and divorces matched the tally of the more famous Hollywood serial wife Lana Turner. Arline surpassed Turner if you count that she married eight different men, whereas Lana's eight marriages included one remarriage (to actor Stephen Crane). The two actresses even shared a former husband!
Originally from Connecticut, Arline's family relocated to New York City during her youth when her father, a newspaperman, moved them. She attended the Ursuline Academy in the Bronx, where she studied dance among other subjects. After briefly working in vaudeville, nightclubs, and other New York musical productions, she caught the eye of an RKO talent scout in 1930 while performing in the Broadway revue "The Second Little Show," leading to a film contract.
Arline debuted with a small flashy role in Bachelor Apartment (1931). Following unremarkable parts in films like An American Tragedy (1931) and Three Who Loved (1931), she gained attention portraying a tawdry good-time girl in Are These Our Children (1931). That year also marked her first marriage to Wesley Ruggles, who was nearly 24 years her senior (she was 19; he was 42), and who directed her in that film. They had a son, Wesley Jr. Nicknamed "One-Take Sally," Arline showed versatility in both sharp comedy and emotional drama, effortlessly shifting from a Wheeler and Woolsey farce such as Girl Crazy (1932) to a Helen Twelvetrees weepie like Young Bride (1932). She often played troublesome characters, such as a scheming waitress in Is My Face Red? (1932) and an unfaithful wife in Flying Devils (1933).
After her RKO contract ended in 1933, Arline freelanced with smaller studios, frequently cast as dubious ladies for amusement. She enjoyed multiple collaborations with comic actor Jack Oakie in Looking for Trouble (1934), Shoot the Works (1934), and King of Burlesque (1936), and worked repeatedly with her husband in Roar of the Dragon (1932), Shoot the Works (1934), and Valiant Is the Word for Carrie (1936). She reliably brightened light comedies like College Scandal (1935), Here Comes Trouble (1936), and the Sonja Henie film One in a Million (1936) with her signature sparkle.
Divorced from Ruggles by 1937, Arline quickly became involved in a tabloid love triangle that led to her second marriage just hours after her divorce was finalized, to Daniel Reid Topping, owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers football team. This marriage lasted about two years and produced a son, Daniel Jr. After their 1940 divorce, Topping co-purchased the New York Yankees in 1945. Less than a month after her second divorce, she married hotel executive James Bryant for her third marriage.
The turmoil of Arline's personal life consumed much time and hampered her acting career. Five years after her previous film, she returned in the mild comedy Harvard, Here I Come! (1941), which led to several wartime "B" and "C" movies including The Lady Is Willing (1942), Song of Texas (1943), G.I. Honeymoon (1945), and From This Day Forward (1946). A small role as a manicurist in the Harold Lloyd comedy The Sin of Harold Diddlebock (1947), also known as Mad Wednesday, ended her 1940s film appearances. During this period, she had an eight-day fourth marriage to Royal Air Force Captain James Adams in 1942; a somewhat longer fifth marriage to advertising executive Vincent Morgan Ryan in 1945; and a sixth marriage to wealthy sportsman Henry (Bob) Topping, brother of her second husband Daniel. After their divorce, Henry married Lana Turner. Her seventh marriage was to insurance man George Ross III (1949-1950), and her eighth and final marriage was in 1955 to Beverly Hills inventor Edward Cooper Heard, which lasted five years.
Amidst the chaos of her marriages, Arline made occasional TV guest appearances in the 1950s and early 1960s on shows like "Perry Mason." She returned briefly to film as the mother of William Wellman Jr. in the poorly received drama A Swingin' Summer (1965), which featured surf music, and appeared as one of the strangling victims in The Crawling Hand (1963), a low-budget horror film.
By the mid-1960s, Arline had largely abandoned both her career—except for a few commercials—and her pursuit of husbands. She spent her final years living in West Hollywood and was found dead of natural causes ("aspiration of gastric contents") on February 7, 1974, just two weeks before her 62nd birthday. She was survived by her two sons and was buried in her home state of Connecticut.
