Lovely Madge Evans, a perpetual sweetheart in films of the 1930s, had been in front of the camera for many years, starting with Fairy Soap commercials at the tender age of two, where she sat on a bar of soap holding a bouquet of violets with the iconic tagline "have you a little fairy in your home?".
As "Baby Madge", she also lent her name to a children's hat company. In 1914, at the age of five, she was discovered by talent scouts to appear in the William Farnum movie The Sign of the Cross, followed by The Seven Sisters with Marguerite Clark.
By the end of the following year, she had amassed some twenty film credits, sharing the screen with notable contemporary stars such as Pauline Frederick or Alice Brady. All of her early films were produced on the East Coast, at studios in Ft.Lee, New Jersey. In 1917, at the age of eight, Madge made her Broadway debut in Peter Ibbetson alongside John Barrymore and Lionel Barrymore. She resumed her stage career in 1926 as an ingenue with Daisy Mayme and the following year appeared with Billie Burke in Noël Coward's costume drama The Marquise.
Her pleasing looks and personality soon caught the attention of Hollywood, and she was eventually signed by MGM in 1931. During the next decade, she appeared in several A-grade productions, including Dinner at Eight, where she played Lionel Barrymore's daughter, and as the dependable Agnes Wickfield in one of the best-ever filmed versions of David Copperfield. She co-starred opposite James Cagney in The Mayor of Hell, Spencer Tracy in The Show-Off, and listened to Bing Crosby crooning the title song in Pennies from Heaven.
Madge received praise for her performance as the star of Beauty for Sale and The New York Times review of January 13, 1934, described her acting in Fugitive Lovers as 'pontaneous and captivating'. Many of her 'typical American girl' roles did not allow her to express aspects of the greater acting range she undoubtedly possessed. Too often she was cast as the 'nice girl' - and those rarely make much of a dramatic impact. On the few occasions she was assigned the role of 'other woman', such as in What Every Woman Knows, audiences found her character difficult to believe and disassociate from her wholesome image.
When her contract with MGM expired in 1937, Madge wound down her film career and, following her 1939 marriage to celebrated playwright Sidney Kingsley, concentrated on being his wife. She last appeared on stage in one of his plays, "The Patriots", in 1943.
