Filmography

84 minutes, black and white, Universal

Release Date: Fall 1945
Director: William A.Seiter
Stars: Franchot Tone, Susanna Foster, David Bruce, Buster Keaton

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed June 30 and July 2-3, 1945. Unbilled, she plays one of six orphans. She has only two spoken lines, but they are more than throwaways.
Review: Hopelessly dated and mired in overacting, That Night with You is fascinating nonetheless. Tone is suave, Foster appealing and Bruce just right as the romantic diner owner whose vision of getting married and having six kids flies in the face of Foster’s dreams of stardom. The “father-daughter” relationship between Tone and Foster is curiously risqué for its time. More curious, however, is why Keaton is wasted in a nothing role. Ironically, the film’s final sequence, a special-effects laugher that ties the plot up in a neat bow, is quite Keatonesque.

88 minutes, black and white, Columbia

Release Date: February 8, 1946
Director: Leslie Fenton
Stars: Fred MacMurray, Marguerite Chapman, Akim Tamiroff, Rita Johnson, Harry Davenport, William Demarest

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed May 1945. Eighth in the credits, she plays Stephani, the daughter of one of the MacMurray characters.
Review: It’s centuries old, but the plot device of mistaken identity works well here, largely because of a clever script and MacMurray’s ability to carve two characters who are different from each other, but not so different to be unbelievable as identical twins. It’s also easy to see why Karolyn drew favorable press attention. Hers is a performance quite credible for a child not yet 5 years old.

104 minutes, color, Paramount
available on video

Release Date: July 25, 1946
Director: Stuart Heisler
Stars: Bing Crosby, Fred Astaire, Joan Caulfield, Billy De Wolfe

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed Sept. 6-8, 1945. Eighth in the credits, she plays Mary Elizabeth, the daughter of the Crosby character.
Review: Few musicals can rise beyond the limitations of formula. In this one, the producers apparently decided not to worry about such aspirations. They were content to pack in as many Irving Berlin songs as possible, stringing them together with the barest of plot. With that understanding, Blue Skies is a lot of fun to watch. The songs and Astaire’s dancing are engaging, and Karolyn’s segment with Crosby for “Getting Nowhere” is a genuine high spot. The only real problem is a dated, interminably long would-be comedy routine by De Wolfe.

Autographed photo available.

118 minutes, black and white, RKO Radio Pictures
available on video

Release Date: September 28 , 1946
Director: Dudley Nichols
Stars: Rosalind Russell, Alexander Knox, Dean Jagger, Philip Merivale

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed between November 1945 and January 1946. Unbilled, she plays a polio victim named Carolyn.
Review: As film biographies go, this one’s not bad, and it follows the story of an underdog/outcast in the medical profession with grace. The sincerity and skill of the Australian nurse played by Russell are sympathetically presented, but to its credit, the movie stops short of fully endorsing her unconventional approach to treating childhood polio. The ambiguity of Kenny’s success nicely prompts a desire to read the autobiography upon which the film was based.

112 minutes, black and white, United Artists
available on video

Release Date: February 25, 1947
Director: Albert Lewin
Stars: George Sanders, Angela Lansbury, Ann Dvorak, John Carradine

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed in the fall of 1946. She is 17th in the credits, plays Laurine and has four segments.
Review: Literate, talky and pretentious, this film professes to examine the wickedness of selfishness, personified by the Sanders character. He is anything but the “bel ami” (best friend) of the title. By today’s standards, Bel Ami moves too slowly and offers no intriguing plot twists, but the acting of Sanders and Lansbury commands interest, as does the Parisian setting. Karolyn does her best to warm the heart of Sanders, but it’s questionable whether his character even has one. For a somber or cynical mood only.

19 minutes (short subject), color, Paramount

Release Date: March 28, 1947
Director: Jerry Hopper
Stars: Richard Webb, Catherine Craig, Griff Barnett, Willie Mastin Trio featuring Sammy Davis, Jr.

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed July 31-Aug. 3, 1946. She is third in the credits and plays Tammie.
Review: This short subject may be a gem. As the film is apparently unavailable for viewing, it’s hard to say. The innocence and honesty of Karolyn’s character help her parents achieve what they, with their adult sensibilities, cannot achieve by themselves. It’s a well-worn theme, but always worth revisiting if played out well.

62 minutes, black and white, Producers Releasing Corporation

Release Date: April, 1947
Director: Basil Wrangell
Stars: Alan Curtis, Terry Austin, Frank Jenks, Tala Birell

Karolyn’s Role: Filmed sometime in December 1946 and January 1947. Unbilled, she plays Pam Roberts.
Review: Weapons emerging ominously from behind curtains, secrets galore, all on a dark, murderous night – this is the B-movie detective formula fully intact. What brightens and shakes up the proceedings, though, is the important plot presence of a little girl (Karolyn) who likes to surprise strangers by brandishing a toy gun. Made of plastic, the gun is really a shell to hold rock candy, and in this case, a stolen emerald. Fun all around.

107 minutes, color, 20th Century Fox
available on video

Release Date: August 19 , 1947
Director: Walter Lang
Stars: Betty Grable, Dan Dailey, Mona Freeman

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed sometime from October 1946 through January 1947. She is unbilled and plays young Iris.
Review: Producers of this musical let too much plot get in the way of the songs, but this movie nevertheless is colorful, energetic and fun.

146 minutes, color, Paramount
available on video

Release Date: October 3, 1947
Director: Cecil B. DeMille
Stars: Gary Cooper, Paulette Goddard, Howard Da Silva, Boris Karloff, Cecil Kellaway

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed in the fall of 1946. She is 133rd in the cast list and plays a “little girl” lying dead in her mother’s arms.
Review: Overacted to the point of melodrama, and overlong even by today’s standards, Unconquered is a curiosity, though an intriguing one. Fans of Cooper and Goddard (once Charles Chaplin’s paramour and co-star) will enjoy these stars trying to bring some credibility to this depiction of pre-Revolutionary War America. Ultimately, it’s as lifeless as the tiny role played by Karolyn. DeMille never did learn that less is more.

108 minutes, black and white, Samuel Goldwyn Productions/RKO Pictures
available on video

Release Date: December 25, 1947
Director: Henry Koster
Stars: Cary Grant, Loretta Young, David Niven, Monty Woolley, James Gleason

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed in the summer of 1947. She is ninth in the credits and plays Debby Brougham.
Review: Not as viscerally emotional and a little distant from mainstream audiences because of its upper-crust setting, The Bishop’s Wife nevertheless ranks with It’s a Wonderful Life as a classic. The actors’ chemistry enhances this angel fable, and the outcome is never quite certain until the end. Delightful sequences fill the film, from the hilarious symbolism of Niven (the bishop) stuck to a donor’s chair, to a warming harp interlude and a stunning hymn from the Mitchell Boychoir. And Karolyn is in the thick of it all.

Autographed Photos Available
DVD Available

89 minutes, color, Paramount-Clarion

Release Date: February 20, 1948
Director: Ray Enright
Stars: Randolph Scott, Barbara Britton, Gabby Hayes, Lon Chaney Jr.

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed sometime from March through June of 1947. She is 10th in the credits and plays Myrtle Walton.
Review: As Western as they come, Albuquerque packs clichés by the stagecoach load. But it’s much more fun than most of its kind, thanks in large part to Karolyn, whose segments never fail to liven up matters. The best instance comes as she earnestly tries, through prison bars, to convince Scott to break out of jail. Beautifully filmed in color.

Autographed Photo Available
DVD Available

90 minutes, black and white, Columbia
available on video

Release Date: May 31, 1949
Director: Sylvan Simon
Stars: Ida Lupino, Glenn Ford, Gig Young, Paul Ford

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed in late 1949. She is unbilled and plays young Martha Bannister.
Review: The narration in this self-titled “documentary Western” strains to emphasize the film’s real-life story, and at times the legendary hype seems a bit melodramatic. But as Saturday matinee fare for impressionable kids, this fills the bill. In the tussle between greed and the secrets of Superstition Mountain, the outcome is never in question. Ford, Lupino and half a dozen bit players, plus the film’s flashback structure, make Lust for Gold interesting nonetheless.

Autographed Photo Available

105 minutes, black and white, Republic Pictures
available on video

Release Date: November 2,1950
Director: John Ford
Stars: John Wayne, Maureen O’Hara, Ben Johnson, Harry Carey Jr., Victor McLaglen, Claude Jarman Jr.

Karolyn’s Role : Filmed in June and July 1950. She is 13th in the credits and plays Margaret Mary.
Review: On the surface, this is a lesser Ford Western, but when it is viewed more than once, a delicate interplay of family, duty and destiny emerge. The gorgeous location photography (not harmed in the least by colorization) helps enormously. Wayne, underplaying, and O’Hara are an intriguing match, and the intertwined activity of young, untried calvarymen and their older, crusty counterparts is far more complex than in typical good-guy/bad-guy tales. The Sons of the Pioneers add symbolism and gallantry to the proceedings.

Autographed Photo Available

90 minutes, color, Republic Pictures

Release Date: November 12, 1951
Director: R.G. Springsteen
Stars: Judy Canova, Eddie Foy Jr., Alan Hale Jr., Walter Catlett

Karolyn’s Role: Filmed in November 1950. She is sixth in the credits and plays Effie.
Review: Laced with cleverly written gags, this is pure corn all the way. There’s a big crisis as a music publishing company has mistakenly pressed 200,000 records of a love song that the country-livin’ Canova had submitted on a lark. The city folks connive to buy her song, “Honeychile,” for a pittance, but it’s not that easy in this rural romp. Karolyn has more screen time in this than any other film, and she exhibits a naturalness as the niece who takes care of Canova’s household. Still, this slick effort is Canova’s film all the way, her brash, brassy singing voice on full display.

120 minutes, color, RKO Radio Pictures
Release Date: November 25, 1952

Director: Charles Vidor
Stars: Danny Kaye, Farley Granger, Jeanmaire

Karolyn’s Role: Filmed in May 1952. She is unbilled and plays a match girl.
Review: The ebullient Danny Kaye is a delight as Hans, particularly in his singing scenes with youngsters. The music and colorful sets are worth slogging through a leaden plot that feels contrived from the outset. A more true-to-life biography may have provided the substance needed to elevate this over-sentimental tale from simplistic children’s fare.