Donna Lee Hickey, born to a vaudevillian family, entered the show business at the age of seventeen as a dancer at the renowned Copacabana nightclub. She went on to win several beauty contests, including "Miss American Legion," "Miss Miami Beach," and "Miss Fire Fighter." In January 1950, she was voted Queen of the New York Press Photographers' Ball, marking the beginning of her journey in the entertainment industry.
After gaining recognition, Donna Lee landed a contract with 20th Century Fox, courtesy of a sympathetic casting department member. However, she struggled to find substantial roles, playing only bit parts for a year. Feeling unfulfilled, she left the studio and joined Columbia Pictures, where she secured a leading role in Edward Dmytryk's classic military courtroom drama, The Caine Mutiny (1954),opposite Humphrey Bogart and Fred MacMurray.
Her character, a night club singer named May Wynn, was so well-received that producer Stanley Kramer insisted she adopt the name as her stage moniker, as there hadn't been a May since the days of May McAvoy and Mae Murray. May Wynn went on to co-star in two westerns, They Rode West (1954) and The Violent Men (1955),but was relegated to second-billing in B-grade films for Poverty Row studios.
In October 1956, May married actor Jack Kelly, who would later become popular as James Garner's younger brother, Bart, in the TV series Maverick (1957). They appeared together in low-budget productions, including Taming Sutton's Gal (1957) and Hong Kong Affair (1958),in which May played a Chinese girl due to the original actress's language struggles.
May also had recurring roles on The Bob Cummings Show (1955) and the short-lived NBC drama series Noah's Ark (1956),shot in color, in which she played a secretary at a veterinary hospital. After retiring from show business in 1960, May worked in real estate. She divorced Kelly in 1964 and married realtor Jack Wesley Custer four years later. This union also ended in divorce in 1979.
As Donna Lee Custer, she retired to Newport Beach, California, where she lived until her passing at the age of 93 on March 22, 2021.
