Nearly hidden today behind a couple of huge trees is this house overlooking the Pacific on the exclusive Palos Verde peninsula. In 1964 the home belonged to Dr. Samuel Stornelli, a neurologist with offices in Hollywood. At 11 pm on November 14, 1964, Dr. Tornelli's houseguest, movie starlet Kate Manx, woke her host and fiancé with the alarming news that she had swallowed a lethal dose of sleeping pills. The divorced mother of a toddler son was rushed to the Little Company of Mary Hospital in Torrance, CA, where, sadly, she passed away. She was 34. Manx had been embroiled in a bitter divorce from her second husband, playwright Leslie Stevens, who had written, produced, and directed her screen debut, Private Property (1960), which had been filmed entirely at the couple's Beverly Hills home. Stevens went on to create the TV series Battlestar Galactica.
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ReplyDeleteNO, she was born in 1930, so she was in fact 34.
DeleteJust caught "Private Property"
ReplyDelete....What a hottie !
ditto, why I am looking her up, what a babe, Gracy Kelly comparable, who was some older woman my Mom's age in my teen years, then I saw at a revival house, REAR WINDOW, and WOW! Also saw TCM doing "Private Property" and I only stayed on it due to the lead-in talk about it.
DeleteI'm watching "Private Property" for the second time, I discovered it last year and it instantly became one of my favorite movies. She is mesmerizing, I am so sad to hear she took her own life at such a young age. I wish there were more films to watch her in.
ReplyDeleteI too just saw "Private Property" for the first time and was instantly smitten with her. Besides her beauty, though she was no great actress, she had an emotional fragility that really came through. Interesting that the movie was shot in her home with Leslie Stevens.
ReplyDeleteBook on Kate Manx and Leslie Stevens coming in the fall of 2020 from McFarland & Company. Author Dore Page spent seven years on research and writing to complete this compelling but sad tale.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the reminder. I've heard good things about it. Looking for it now.
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ReplyDeleteThanks so much for the great research and interesting read. "Private Property" is a gem of a movie. It's also an amazing little time capsule for Hollywood history buffs. Do you have the address for the Stevens's Hollywood Hills house that the movie was filmed in? I have looked endlessly on Google maps but haven't found it. Am thinking it might have been torn down and replaced with something new. Am looking forward to the book and will enjoy it thoroughly! Thanks again! :)
ReplyDeleteWatched "Heros Island and it was set in the 17th century and I liked it because i like all that were in the movie. Like James Mason, Neville Brand, Rip Torn, Warren Oates, Harry Dean Stanton and believe it or not the guy that brought me to the movie (because I was looking at 1980s movies) Darby Hinton. Hinton plays the blonde kid Jafar, he is about 4 years old.
ReplyDeleteGood little movie.
Thanks
P.S. Neville plays an unsavory character and is in the picture at the end or last 30 or so minutes.
I am not getting far with this. Why would she commit suicide? Not possible. She got the house, got the child, had a Dr. for a fiance and was in bed with him when she wakes him up and states l have taken a lethal dose of sleeping pills?? What by accident?? And how many do you need to take to kill yourself, 5, 10, 20?? He was a Doctor. I think this death stinks of something fishy. She had it all and was a great, honest actress and had a great screen presence.
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