By her own reckoning, blonde character actress Lee Patrick "played them all: big sister, society matron, hooker, wisecracker, bubble dancer, nuthouse inmate, and even a song and dance girl." She started her career on Broadway, working with such powerhouse talents as Spencer Tracy, George M. Cohan, Pat O'Brien, and George S. Kaufman. Her first film was the New York-based Strange Cargo (1929), though it would be seven years before she'd settle permanently in Hollywood. Patrick acted opposite everyone from Errol Flynn to Laurel and Hardy during her 25-year film career; her most famous assignment was as Effie Perrine, Humphrey Bogart's ever-loving secretary, in The Maltese Falcon (1941). During the 1950s, Patrick switched from hard-boiled roles to matronly characters. From 1953 to 1955, she played the flighty Henrietta Topper on the popular TV sitcom Topper. After 11 years of retirement, Lee Patrick was coaxed back before the cameras to revive her Effie Perrine character in the risible Maltese Falcon "sequel" The Black Bird (1975).
by Hal Erickson
biography
