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Betty Furness
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Born in New York, New York, Furness began her professional career as a model before being signed to a film contract by RKO Studios. Her first film role was as the "Thirteenth Woman" in the 1932 film Thirteen Women but her scenes were deleted before the film's release. Over the next few years she appeared in several RKO films, and became a popular actress. Among her film successes were Magnificent Obsession (1935) and the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers film Swing Time (1936). By the end of the decade she had appeared in over forty films, but during the 1940s found it difficult to secure acting roles.
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Delightful musical stars Fred Astaire as a roguish gambler/dancer who is challenged by fiancee Betty Furness' father to come up with $25,000 to prove he's worthy of her hand. But after he falls in love with dance instructor Ginger Rogers, Fred'll do anything to keep from earning the bucks. The Jerome Kern-Dorothy Fields score includes "The Way You Look Tonight," "A Fine Romance" and "Pick Yourself Up." With Victor Moore. 104 min. Standard; Soundtrack: English Dolby Digital mono; Subtitles: English, French, Spanish; audio commentary; featurette; bonus shorts "Hotel a la Swing" (1937), "Bingo Crosbyana" (1936); theatrical trailer.
Calm Yourself starts off as ace advertising man Pat (Robert Young) is fired from his job when he offends the highly offendable -- and none too likeable -- Mary Elizabeth (Betty Furness). This segues into a phony kidnapping scheme that thrusts Pat and Mary together, furthering their mutual animosity. Fortunately for Pat, heroine Rosalind (Madge Evans) is an agreeable sort, and it is she with whom he ends up at fadeout time. Nat Pendleton goes through his usual paces as comic-opera gangster Knuckles Benedict. Director George B. Seitz, who ground out four films for MGM in 1935, allows the cast of Calm Yourself to mug and glower to their heart's content: some of it is funny, some of it isn't. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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From All Movie Guide: It's very likely that Betty Furness would be forgotten today if she'd remained a film actress. The daughter of pioneering radio executive George Furness, she landed her first modeling job at 14 and an RKO-Radio film contract two years later. From 1932 through 1935, she appeared in a string of forgettable ingénue roles in Tom Keene Westerns and B-melodramas. She exhibited an unexpected flair for screwball comedy in the 1936 Hal Roach production Mister Cinderella, but wasn't able to capitalize on this career highlight and was out of pictures by 1939 (except for a cameo appearance as herself in 1957's A Face in the Crowd). She fared rather better on Broadway in the 1940s, and better still when she ventured into television in 1949. Though she still occasionally acted in the 1950s (she even starred in a "girl reporter" crime series), her TV fame rested securely on her work as a commercial spokesperson.
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Astair plays John "Lucky" Garnett, a tap-dancer, who is engaged to Margaret Watson, played by Betty Furness. As the movie begins, he is finishing a routine in a nightclub and is changing to go to his wedding. He plans to leave show-business to become a professional gambler, he tells his old sidekick, Dr. Edward "Pop" Cardetti, played by the marvelously nervous Victor Moore.
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U.S. President Richard M. Nixon recently announced that he intends to abolish the office of Presidential Assistant on Consumer Affairs, currently held by Betty Furness. His idea is that the consumer must be "encouraged to protect himself "caveat emptor." He has ... made the inconsistent announcement that consumer welfare will be "the explicit responsibility of every department and agency head." This general admonishment also seems odd, since Nixon simultaneously announced that he intends to "put the brakes on" activities of the regulatory agencies.
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Betty Furness