Born into a show-biz family, Bonita Granville first appeared onstage at the age of 3 and began making films at 9. As a child actress she was frequently cast as a mean, spiteful, naughty little girl; examples include These Three (1936), in which she played a mischievous girl spreading malicious lies about her teachers (and for which, at the age of 13, she received a "Best Supporting Actress" Oscar nomination), and Maid of Salem (1937), in which she lead a hysterical group of village girls as accusers in the Salem Witch Trials. As a teen she also played "nicer" girls, as in the title role in the series of four detective-reporter Nancy Drew movies, as well as a blond, blue-eyed Aryan Nazi "ideal youth" in the huge hit Hitler's Children (1943). She later gained standard leading lady roles before retiring from the screen in the '50s. Bonita Granville married a millionaire in 1947 and subsequently became a businesswoman as well as the producer of the TV series Lassie.
Bonita Granville
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- Born in a family of artists, her parents were actors, her grandmother was a ballerina and her grandfather was an opera conductor.
- Along with her husband, Jack Wrather, owned and operated the Disneyland Hotel in Anaheim, California, until it was acquired by the Disney Corporation in 1988.
- After her husband's passing, took over as chairman of the board at the Wrather Corporation.
- From 1986 to 1988, served as chair of the American Film Institute.
- Founder-member of the Los Angeles Music Center, former president of the Los Angeles Orphanage Guild and a member of The Amazing Blue Ribbon.