Claudette Colbert was an American leading lady and a Broadway and film actress, especially during the “Golden Years†of Hollywood. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress in her saucy role as a runaway bride in 1934’s It Happened One Night, opposite Clark Gable, in which she shockingly lifted her skirts to entice a driver to stop for her. This was, by the way, the same film in which Clark Gable disrobed to show – gasp – he was not wearing an undershirt! Ah, such were the times… At any rate, Ms. Colbert enjoyed a long and happy career and life, appearing in such successes as 1944’s Since You Went Away and 1947’s The Egg and I. At a time when leading ladies were true “ladiesâ€, Claudette Colbert personified the genre.
