R.I.P. Allene Roberts

[Defenestrator]

Among the other devastating passings this weekend, how saddening it is to learn that Allene Roberts has died at 90, with an eleven-year career that started in 1947 until her retirement in 1957. Perhaps remembered most for her first movie "The Red House" with Edward G. Robinson and later "Knock on Any Door" with Humphrey Bogart, her most memorable role for me was opposite Johnny Sheffield in "Bomba on Panther Island" (1949). Allene, by the way, was the last of the four young stars of that film to survive, all of whom have passed in the last decade. She was also Leonard Nimoy's leading lady in his first starring film "Kid Monk Baroni" (1951), and it was during that film that she became lifelong friends with Jack Larson with whom she later worked in three episodes of "The Adventures of Superman" (also working again with Noel Neill from that show in an episode of the show "Public Defender"). Funny that looking through her credits, it occurred to me that she worked with two of the three great Warner Bros. gangster actors, Bogart and Robinson, but not James Cagney, until I reached her later TV work and learned of the unlikelihood that just before she was to retire, Cagney uncharacteristically took an acting role on television starring in a short film ("A Link in the Chain") made for the Christian-themed TV show "Christopher Closeup" (then known as "The Christophers") that I had never been aware of until now, so it turns out Allene worked with him as well. Her other films included "The Hoodlum" with Lawrence Tierney and "Santa Fe" with Randolph Scott (both from 1951) and "Union Station" (1950) with William Holden.

[TopBilled]

Thanks for mentioning this.

She was very good in THE RED HOUSE.

But sh! not a peep. Or Edward G. Robinson might hurt you.