Gwen Wakeling

Birth : 1901-03-03, Detroit, Michigan, USA

Death : 1982-06-16

History

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Costume designer Gwen Wakeling (birth name Gwen Sewell, March 3, 1901, Detroit, Michigan – June 16, 1982, Los Angeles, California) was a personal favourite of Cecil B. DeMille. Indeed her first film was his 1927 epic "The King of Kings", and she earned an Academy Award for her work on his version of "Samson and Delilah" in 1950. In a career spanning over 140 films, she also worked for director John Ford on such films as "The Prisoner of Shark Island" (1936), "Drums Along the Mohawk" (1939), "The Grapes of Wrath" (1940) and "How Green Was My Valley" (1941), and provided the costumes for most of the Shirley Temple films, such as Little Miss Broadway, in the 1930s. One of her last assignments was creating Barbara Eden's "Jeannie" costumes for I Dream Of Jeannie in 1965. Wakeling was a member of the Bahá'í Faith, and her husband, Henry J. Staudigl, set up an arts endowment in her memory at Bosch Bahá'í School in Santa Cruz to promote artistic endeavors and included a research and resource library.

Movies

Frankie and Johnny
Costume Design
Johnny is a riverboat entertainer with a big gambling problem. After a fortune-teller tells Johnny how he can change his luck, the appearance of a new 'lady luck' soon causes a cat fight with Johnny's girlfriend, Frankie.
From the Earth to the Moon
Costume Design
Set just after the American civil war, businessman and inventor Victor Barbicane invents a new source of power called Power X. He plans to use it to power rockets, and to show its potential he plans to send a projectile to the moon. Joining him for the trip are his assistant Ben Sharpe, Barbicane's arch-rival Stuyvesant Nicholl, and Nicholl's daughter Virginia. Nicholl believes that Power X goes against the will of God and sabotages the projectile so that they cannot return to earth, setting up a suspenseful finale as they battle to repair the projectile.
The River's Edge
Costume Design
A murderous thief on the run with stolen loot forces a poor rancher to guide him across the desert into Mexico. Accompanying them is the rancher's wife, who happens to be the killer's former girlfriend.
Johnny Concho
Costume Design
In Johnny Concho, Frank Sinatra plays a man who goes from the town bully to town coward!
Great Day in the Morning
Costume Design
After a card game, Southerner Owen Pentecost finds himself the owner of a Denver hotel. Involved with two women, he then has to make even more fundamental choices when, with the start of the Civil War, he becomes one of a small minority in a strongly Unionist town.
Blood Alley
Costume Design
A merchant marine captain, rescued from the Chinese Communists by local visitors, is "shanghaied" into transporting the whole village to Hong Kong on an ancient paddle steamer.
Escape to Burma
Costume Design
A fugitive in British Burma hides on a tea plantation, thanks to a mutual attraction with owner Gwen Moore.
Track of the Cat
Costume Design
A family saga: In a stunning mountain valley ranch setting near Aspen, complex and dangerous family dynamics play out against the backdrop of the first big snowstorm of winter and an enormous panther with seemingly mythical qualities which is killing cattle.
Silver Lode
Wardrobe Designer
Dan Ballard, a respected citizen in the western town of Silver Lode, has his wedding interrupted by four men led by Ned McCarty, an old acquaintance who, as a US Marshal, arrests Ballard for the murder of his brother and the theft of $20,000. Ballard seeks to stall McCarty while tracking down evidence that will prove his innocence.
Samson and Delilah
Costume Design
When strongman Samson rejects the love of the beautiful Philistine woman Delilah, she seeks vengeance that brings horrible consequences they both regret. The classic story of Samson and Delilah as told by Cecil B. DeMille.
Unconquered
Costume Designer
England, 1763. After being convicted of a crime, the young and beautiful Abigail Hale agrees, to escape the gallows, to serve fourteen years as a slave in the colony of Virginia, whose inhabitants begin to hear and fear the sinister song of the threatening drums of war that resound in the wild Ohio valley.
Cover Girl
Costume Design
A nightclub dancer makes it big in modeling, leaving her dancer boyfriend behind.
To the Shores of Tripoli
Costume Design
Chronicle of a spoiled rich boy who joins the Marines with an off-handed attitude and finally becomes a battle-wise soldier. Academy Award Nominations: Best (Color) Cinematography.
Tales of Manhattan
Costume Design
Ten screenwriters collaborated on this series of tales concerning the effect a tailcoat cursed by its tailor has on those who wear it. The video release features a W.C. Fields segment not included in the original theatrical release.
Moontide
Costume Design
After a drunken night out, a longshoreman thinks he may have killed a man.
This Above All
Costume Design
In 1940 England, aristocratic Prudence Cathaway alarms her snobbish parents by joining the WAF service branch. She soon meets and falls in love with the brooding Clive Briggs, despite his prejudice against the upper classes, and agrees to spend a week with him at a Dover hotel. When Clive's soldier friend, Monty, arrives to retrieve him, Prudence learns that Clive went AWOL after Dunkirk, and urges him to recall why England must fight the war.
Song of the Islands
Costume Design
With his sidekick Rusty, Jeff Harper sails to paradisiacal tropical isle Ahmi-Oni to bargain on behalf of his cattle baron father for land owned by transplanted Irishman Dennis O'Brien. But Jeff falls in love with O'Brien's daughter, Eileen, and even his father can't break them up after he arrives and himself falls under the spell of island splendor.
Roxie Hart
Costume Designer
A café in Chicago, 1942. On a rainy night, veteran reporter Homer Howard tells an increasing audience the story of Roxie Hart and the crime she was judged for in 1927.
Son of Fury: The Story of Benjamin Blake
Costume Design
Sir Arthur Blake has inherited title and lands from his brother. He also has his orphaned nephew Benjamin working for him as a bonded servant. While he believes the lad was born out of wedlock and so cannot claim the inheritance, he is taking no chances. Benjamin eventually rebels against his uncle and sets sail to try and make his fortune. This may enable him to return to prove his claim to being the rightful heir to the estate.
Rise and Shine
Costume Design
The college president, the head cheerleader and a gambling gangster try to keep a flunking football star in the game
Swamp Water
Costume Design
A hunter happens upon a fugitive and his daughter living in a Georgia swamp. He falls in love with the girl and persuades the fugitive to return to town.
I Wake Up Screaming
Costume Design
A young promoter is accused of the murder of Vicky Lynn, a young actress he "discovered" as a waitress while out with ex-actor Robin Ray and gossip columnist Larry Evans.
How Green Was My Valley
Costume Design
At the turn of the century in a Welsh mining village, the Morgans (he stern, she gentle) raise coal-mining sons and hope their youngest will find a better life.
Week-End in Havana
Costume Design
A ship company employee, Jay Williams, is sent to Florida where one of the company cruise ships is stuck on a reef off of the coast. He obtains waivers from all of the passengers with the exception of Nan Spencer, a department store salesgirl who wants her vacation NOW, not later. Jay is instructed to take Nan to Havana and set her up in the best hotel and keep her entertained. She visits a night club where the star attraction is Rosita Rivas, and meets Rosita's worthless manager, Monte Blanca, who makes a play for her. Trouble also comes in the form of Jay's fiancée, Terry McCracken, when a romance develops between Nan and Jay.
A Man Betrayed
Costume Design
Bucolic lawyer John Wayne takes on big-city corruption in A Man Betrayed. He sets out to prove that an above-suspicion politician (Edward Ellis) is actually a crook. The price of integrity is sweet in this instance, since Wayne happens to be in love with the politician's daughter (Frances Dee).
Brigham Young
Costume Design
Based on the story of the famous Mormon leader, it follows Brigham Young and his challenge to transport his people across the Rocky mountains to settle in Salt Lake City. The plot focuses on two fictitious characters, Jonathan Kent and Zina Webb and the hardships they have to face along the way.
Young People
Costume Design
Wendy Ballantine's parents decide to retire from show biz so she can have a normal life. They are unwelcome in the small town until a storm lets the family show their stuff.
Johnny Apollo
Costume Design
Wall Street broker Robert Cain, Sr., is jailed for embezzling. His college graduate son Bob then turns to crime to raise money for his father's release. As assistant to mobster Mickey Dwyer, then falls for Dwyer's girl Lucky. He winds up in the same prison as his father.
Star Dust
Costume Design
When the studios reject her because she"s too young, a young actress sets out to build a career on her own.
The Grapes of Wrath
Costume Design
Tom Joad returns to his home after a jail sentence to find his family kicked out of their farm due to foreclosure. He catches up with them on his Uncle’s farm, and joins them the next day as they head for California and a new life... Hopefully.
The Blue Bird
Costume Design
An ungrateful girl and her little brother are transported in their dreams by a fairy to a wonderland, tasked with finding the mythical blue bird of happiness, meeting friends and foes along the way.
Drums Along the Mohawk
Costume Designer
Albany, New York, 1776. After marrying, Gil and Lana travel north to settle on a small farm in the Mohawk River Valley, but soon their growing prosperity and happiness are threatened by the sinister sound of drums that announce dark times of revolution and war.
The Rains Came
Costume Design
Indian aristocrat Rama Safti returns from medical training in the U.S. to give his life to the poor folk of Ranchipur. Lady Edwina and her drunken artist ex-lover Tom Ransome get in the way, but everyone shapes up when faced by earthquake, flooding, and plague.
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
Costume Design
Having once again avoided criminal conviction, Professor Moriarity develops a murderous plan to “finish off” his last major nemesis, Sherlock Holmes, by making him fail to prevent the perfect crime. Does it involve a family curse, the crown jewels of England, or something else…
Hotel for Women
Costume Design
Guests at a women's residence club help a jilted small-town girl turn to modelling.
Susannah of the Mounties
Costume Design
This classic family drama stars Shirley Temple as young orphan Susannah Sheldon, the sole survivor of a brutal Indian attack who's befriended by Canadian Mountie Angus Montague (Randolph Scott) and his girlfriend, Vicky (Margaret Lockwood). The couple takes Susannah under their wing and soon learn that having a precocious child around can come in handy; when the Indians return, the girl uses her charm to broker peace.Shirley is the orphaned survivor of an Indian attack in the Canadian West. A Mountie and his girlfriend take her in...
The Gorilla
Costume Designer
When an escaped circus gorilla appears to have gone on a murderous rampage, a threatened attorney calls on the detective trio of Garrity, Harrigan and Mullivan to act as bodyguards. In short order, we discover that there is more to the attorney than meets the eye, and the ape may be innocent after all. When a pretty young heiress faces peril, it's up to our heroic trio to save the day.
The Return of the Cisco Kid
Costume Design
In Arizona a young woman who's being manipulated by an evil businessman is helped by the Cisco Kid who happens to be there on holiday.
The Hound of the Baskervilles
Costume Design
On his uncle's death Sir Henry Baskerville returns from Canada to take charge of his ancestral hall on the desolate moors of Devonshire, and finds that Sherlock Holmes is there to investigate the local belief that his uncle was killed by a monster hound that has roamed the moors since 1650, and is likely to strike again at Sir Henry.
The Little Princess
Costume Design
A little girl goes in search of her father who is reported missing by the military during the Second Boer War.
Tail Spin
Costume Design
Trixie is a female pilot looking to win a big race to advance her career. During one race, however, her plane becomes damaged, and she needs help to repair it. She meets a Navy pilot named "Tex" Price and tries to gain his aid. Tex soon meets another pilot, Gerry, a novice who seeks to win an important upcoming race. Tex, concerned for Gerry's safety, tries to convince her not to race. But Gerry, now a rival of Trixie's, is determined to fly.
Kentucky
Costume Design
Young lovers Jack and Sally are from families that compete to send horses to the 1938 Kentucky Derby, but during the Civil War, her family sided with the South while his sided with the North--and her Uncle Peter will have nothing to do with Jack's family.
Submarine Patrol
Costume Design
A naval officer is demoted for negligence and put in command of a run-down submarine chaser with a motley crew.
Just Around the Corner
Costume Design
Penny helps her idealistic architect father get his dream of a slum clearance project; The little miss dances with Corporal Jones.
Gateway
Costume Design
Irish immigrant meets returning war correspondent on a liner bound for New York. When she resists the amours of another passenger, charges result in her being detained at Ellis Island.
Little Miss Broadway
Costume Design
An orphan is provisionally adopted by the manager of a hotel populated by show business people. The hotel's owner doesn't like the entertainers and wants the girl returned to the orphanage.
I'll Give a Million
Costume Design
After saving a tramp from suicide, a millionaire takes his clothing and disappears. Word is out that he will give a million dollars to anyone who is kind to a tramp.
Three Blind Mice
Costume Design
Three sisters take their small inheritance and move from Kansas to California in search of rich husbands. To start with Pamela poses as a socialite and Moira and Elizabeth pretend to be her staff.
Alexander's Ragtime Band
Costume Design
Classical violinist, Roger Grant disappoints his family and teacher when he organizes a jazz band, but he and the band become successful. Roger falls in love with the band's singer, Stella, but his reluctance to lose her leads him to thwart her efforts to become a solo star. When the World War separates them in 1917, Stella marries Roger's best friend and, when Roger returns home after the war, an important concert at Carnegie Hall brings the corners of the romantic triangle together.
Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm
Costume Design
Rebecca's Uncle Harry leaves her with Aunt Miranda who forbids her to associate with show people. But neighbor Anthony Kent is a talent scout who secretly set it up for her to broadcast.
Sally, Irene and Mary
Costume Design
Manicurists Sally, Irene and Mary hope to be Broadway entertainers. When Mary inherits an old ferry boat, they turn it into a successful supper club.
Wife, Doctor and Nurse
Costume Design
Social butterfly marries Park Avenue doctor and learns that his nurse is in love with him.
Wake Up and Live
Costume Design
Satire on radio, built around the supposed feud between bandleader Ben Bernie and journalist Walter Winchell.
Wee Willie Winkie
Costume Design
In 1897, little Priscilla Williams, along with her widowed mother, goes to live with her army colonel paternal grandfather on the British outpost he commands in northern India.
Seventh Heaven
Costume Design
A Parisian sewer worker longs for a rise in status and a beautiful wife. He rescues a girl from the police, lives with her in a barren flat on the seventh floor, and then marches away to war.
Nancy Steele Is Missing!
Costume Design
After being in jail for seventeen years a crook is met by the girl he kidnapped as a baby. She now thinks he's her father. When he returns her to her real father there's a job and a reward, but an old prisonmate gets in the way.
On the Avenue
Costume Design
A new Broadway show starring Gary Blake shamelessly lampoons the rich Carraway family. To get her own back, daughter Mimi sets out to ensnare Blake, but the courtship is soon for real, to the annoyance of his co-star, hoofing chanteuese Mona Merrick.
Banjo on My Knee
Costume Design
A young husband leaves his river shantyboat community in Pecan Point, Tennessee and travels to New Orleans in search of his runaway wife.
White Hunter
Costume Design
Safari guide Capt. Clark Rutledge is hired by the man Michael Varek who was responsible for his father's death...
Pigskin Parade
Costume Design
Bessie and Winston "Slug" Winters are married coaches whose mission is to whip their college football team into shape. Just in time, they discover a hillbilly farmhand and his sister. But the hillbilly farmhand's ability to throw melons enables him to become their star passing ace.
Ramona
Costume Design
Half-Indian girl brought up in a wealthy household is loved by the son of the house against his family's wishes and loves another Indian employed by the household.
The Road to Glory
Costume Design
The story of trench life during World War I through the lives of a French regiment. As men are killed and replaced jaunty Lt. Denet becomes more and more somber. His rival for the affection of nurse Monique is Capt. La Roche. Written by Ed Stephan
Poor Little Rich Girl
Costume Design
Cossetted and bored, Barbara Barry is finally sent off to school by her busy if doting widowed soap manufacturer father. When her nurse is injured en route, Barbara finds herself alone in town, ending up as part of radio song-and-dance act Dolan and Dolan sponsored by a rival soap company.
Private Number
Costume Design
Ellen Neal, a young and inexperienced maid, becomes romantically involved with her employers son which causes various complications. The head butler also has an infatuation for the young girl but his intentions are not that good.
Half Angel
Costume Design
Allison Long is acquitted on charges of poisoning her father but then her benefactor is poisoned. Reporter Duffy Giles has faith in her innocence.
Under Two Flags
Costume Design
Sergeant Victor comes to the French Foreign Legion after taking the blame for his brother's crime. Cigarette falls in love with him though Major Doyle is in love with her. Doyle sends Victor on dangerous assignments to be rid of him. He falls in love with Lady Venetia Cunningham, a visitor to the garrison
The Prisoner of Shark Island
Costume Designer
After healing the leg of the murderer John Wilkes Booth, responsible for the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln, perpetrated on April 14, 1865, during a performance at Ford's Theatre in Washington; Dr. Samuel A. Mudd, considered part of the atrocious conspiracy, is sentenced to life imprisonment and sent to the sinister Shark Island Prison.
It Had to Happen
Costume Design
A poor boy rises to power in politics.
King of Burlesque
Costume Design
Warner Baxter plays the ambitious producer of a burlesque show who rises to the big time on Broadway. Alice Faye is the loyal burleycue singer who helps make Baxter a success. His head turned by sudden fame, Baxter falls under the spell of a society woman (Mona Barrie) who has theatrical aspirations of her own. She marries Baxter, then convinces him to produce a string of "artistic" plays rather than his extravagant musical revues. The plays are flops, and the woman haughtily divorces Baxter. Faithful Alice Faye, who'd gone to London when her ex-beau was married, returns to the penniless Baxter. She and her burlesque buddies team up to pull Baxter out of his rut and put him on top again.
The Littlest Rebel
Costume Design
Virgie Cary's father, a rebel officer, sneaks back to his rundown plantation to see his dying wife and is arrested. A Yankee officer takes pity and sets up an escape. Everyone is captured and the officers are to be executed. Virgie and Uncle Billy beg President Lincoln to intercede.
The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo
Costume Design
A Russian prince goes to Monte Carlo just after World War I with money supplied to him by Parisian Russians. He wins but the casino operators want him to honor the tradition of returning to the tables.
Transatlantic Merry-Go-Round
Costume Design
Underworld king Lee Lother has been killed aboard a ocean liner, several people could have been the murderer. There is his mistress Anya Roysen, a married woman, who was jealous of his flirtations with his old moll, night club singer Sally Marsh, who had agreed for one last night with Lother, to get her younger brother Ned out of the Lother's clutches because he has faked Lother's name on a check to pay his gambling debts. Then there is Sally's new flame Jimmy Brett, a con man and gentlemen thief, who has out-tricked Lother in a fixed poker game, and is, together with shorty, after the ladies jewels. Inspector McKinney suspects Joe Saunders, a recently released convict, who was arrested due to some tips by Lother, but Ned and Sally insist that they committed the crime alone.
The Affairs of Cellini
Costume Design
The 16th-century sculptor woos the Duchess of Florence despite the duke.
Bulldog Drummond Strikes Back
Costume Design
Bulldog Drummond finds himself immersed in another adventure when he stumbles upon a corpse in the mysterious London mansion of Prince Achmed. Enlisting the help of his old friend Algy and the beautiful Lola, Drummond uncovers a scheme to ship illegal cargo into the country. He must rely on his cunning to survive when the prince offers a reward for his capture.
Born to Be Bad
Costume Design
Letty, a young woman who ended up pregnant, unmarried and on the streets at fifteen is bitter and determined that her child will not grow up to be taken advantage of. Letty teaches her child to lie, steal, cheat and anything else he'll need to be street smart.
The Last Gentleman
Costume Design
In New England circa 1933, a niece is reported missing and presumed dead and Cabot Barr (George Arliss) summons his relatives to the family estate for a memorial service. Once there, Barr taunts each one, claiming their only interest in him is his money, and sends them away when the report about the niece proves to be false. Only niece Marjorie, who has ridiculed one of his pet eccentricities, seems to be the object of any sentimental affection.
Looking for Trouble
Costume Design
Joe and Casey trouble-shoot for the phone company. They try to prove that Joes's girl Ethel's boss Dan is a crook but are trapped by criminals and left in a burning building.
Gallant Lady
Costume Design
Unwed mother gives up baby for adoption and hopes to get it back when the adoptive mother dies.
Advice to the Lovelorn
Costume Design
Los Angeles newspaper reporter Toby Prentiss is continually in trouble with his editor. He is demoted to running the paper's "Miss Lonelyhearts" advice column because he missed the scoop on a major earthquake whilst out on the town. Determined to be fired from the column he starts to give crazy advice to the readers, but this only makes him even more popular.
Lady with a Past
Costume Design
A wealthy girl hires a male escort to make one of her male friends jealous. She spreads rumours about her character that makes her popular amongst all bachelors in the city including her friend.
A Woman Commands
Costume Design
In order to keep his lover, Maria Draga, in luxury, Captain Alex Pastitsch contracts huge debts which threaten his military career. To save Alex's career, his superior officer, Colonel Strádimirovitsch has an idea of how to fix it.
Panama Flo
Costume Design
An engineer makes a thieving entertainer work off her debts as a housekeeper at his jungle mining camp.
The Big Shot
Costume Design
A young man runs into trouble when he buys an auto court, only to find out that its located next to a swamp that drives away all potential customers.
Suicide Fleet
Costume Design
Three US sailors aboard a decoy ship fight German U-boats in World War I and try to win Sally who works on the Coney Island midway.
Freighters of Destiny
Costume Supervisor
A young man seeks vengeance on the outlaws who killed his father.
The Tip-Off
Costume Design
A young radio repairman becomes involved with gangsters and one of their girlfriends when he repairs their radio.
Devotion
Costume Design
A young Londoner (Ann Harding) disguises herself to become governess of the son of the barrister (Leslie Howard) she loves.
The Big Gamble
Costume Design
A gambler, hopelessly in debt, agrees to pay off his debt by allowing his creditor to take out a life insurance policy on him and collecting once the one-year suicide clause has elapsed.
Born to Love
Costume Design
A pregnant American nurse living in London during WWI, believing her soldier-fiance has been killed in France, marries a wealthy aristocrat so her child will have a father.
Beyond Victory
Costume Design
Four battle-weary American soldiers under fire reflect on the women they left behind.
The Painted Desert
Costume Design
Western pardners Jeff and Cash find a baby boy in an otherwise deserted emigrants' camp, and clash over which is to be "father." They are still bitterly feuding years later when they own adjacent ranches. Bill, the foundling whom Cash has raised to young manhood, wants to end the feud and extends an olive branch toward Jeff, who now has a lovely daughter. But during a mining venture, the bitterness escalates. Is Bill to be set against his own adoptive father?
Sin Takes a Holiday
Costume Design
Dowdy Sylvia accepts her boss' marriage proposal, even though he only asked her to avoid marriage to another woman. As a wealthy wife, Sylvia changes from ugly duckling to uninhibited swan and even contemplates having an affair with a man she meets during a trip to Paris.
Her Man
Costume Design
A sex worker yearns to leave the grimy underground community she was born into, and sees her way out through a sympathetic sailor.
Holiday
Costume Design
A young man is torn between his free-thinking lifestyle and the tradition of his wealthy fiancée's family.
Swing High
Costume Design
To avoid hostilities, Maryan, the ward of Doc May, a medicine show owner, induces Pop Garner, a circus owner, to join forces with her guardian. Doc May and Daphne, his wife, work as clowns; and Garry, a singing soldier of fortune, sings along with Maryan's act. Ruth, Maryan's partner, quits to get married; and Joe, who is jealous of Garry, replaces her with Trixie, his former assistant. When Garry announces his engagement to Maryan, Trixie persuades him to join a strip poker game in a drunken state and "compromises" him in the presence of his fiancée. Grief-stricken, Maryan falls during her act, and Garry, robbed of circus funds, is arrested. In spite of her injuries, Maryan, learning of Trixie's treachery, performs the act with her and forces a confession by threatening to drop her; Garry is released and is welcomed back to the show.
The Racketeer
Costume Design
A dapper gangster sponsors an alcoholic violinist in order to win the love of a glamorous divorced socialite.
Her Private Affair
Costume Design
A married society woman accidentally kills her would-be lover and blackmailer and then suffers a crisis of conscience when his disgruntled butler is charged with the crime.
Paris Bound
Costume Design
Jim Hutton and Mary Archer are two liberals who are content to remain faithful to each other in spirit only. They are married with all the ritual of a church wedding, the bride believing that each should be allowed perfect freedom in personal contacts. Complications arise when these ideals are put into practice.