Grace Darmond

Grace Darmond was a Canadian-American silent film actress who signed with the Selig Polyscope Company in 1914 and appeared in roughly 67 films over the next thirteen years. She starred alongside Niles Welch in The Gulf Between (1917), the first film shot in Technicolor, and went on to appear in What Every Woman Wants (1919), Valley of the Giants (1919), and the title role of So Long Letty (1920), though she never broke through to leading stardom in major productions. Within Hollywood's inner circle, Darmond was known as part of Alla Nazimova's "sewing circle" of queer actresses, and was the longtime lover of actress Jean Acker, whom she met in 1918; on Acker's wedding night to Rudolph Valentino in 1919, Acker locked him out of their hotel suite and fled to Darmond's home, an episode widely understood as reflecting Acker's actual romantic attachment. Darmond's career declined with the arrival of sound film, and like many silent-era stars she was unable to make the transition to talkies, retiring after her last notable film, Wide Open (1927).