June Havoc

Following their parents' divorce, the two sisters earned the family's income by appearing in vaudeville, where June's talent often overshadowed Louise's. Baby June got an audition with Alexander Pantages, who had come to Seattle, Washington in 1902 to build theaters up and down the west coast of the United States.

Soon, she was launched in vaudeville and also appeared in Hollywood movies.

She could not speak until the age of three, but the films were all silent.

She would cry for the cameras when her mother told her that the family's dog had died.

June Havoc (born Ellen Evangeline Hovick; November 8, 1912 – March 28, 2010) was an American actress, dancer, stage director and memoirist.

Havoc was a child vaudeville performer under the tutelage of her mother Rose Thompson Hovick, born Rose Evangeline Thompson.

June later acted on Broadway and in Hollywood, and stage-directed, both on and off-Broadway.

Havoc acknowledged in her later years that 1912 was likely the correct year.

She was reportedly uncertain of the year.

Her mother forged various birth certificates for both her daughters to evade child labor laws.

Her life-long career in show business began when she was a child, billed as "Baby June."

Her sister, entertainer Gypsy Rose Lee (born as Rose Louise Hovick), was called "Louise" by her family members.

Their parents were Rose Thompson Hovick, of German descent, and John ("Jack") Olaf Hovick, the son of Norwegian immigrants, who worked as an advertising agent and reporter for the Seattle Times newspaper.

For many years 1916 was cited as her year of birth.

In December 1928, Havoc, in an effort to escape her overbearing mother, eloped with Bobby Reed, a boy in the vaudeville act.

Weeks later after performing at the Jayhawk Theatre in Topeka, Kansas on December 29, 1928, June's mother, Rose, reported Reed to the Topeka Police, and he was arrested.

Rose pulled out a concealed gun when she met Bobby at the police station, intending to shoot him, but the gun didn't fire because the safety was on.

She then physically attacked her son-in-law, and the police had to pry her off the hapless Reed.

June subsequently left both her family and the act and, though the marriage didn't last, the two remained friends.

She adopted the surname Havoc, a variant of her birth name.

In 1936, Havoc got her first part on Broadway in the Sigmund Romberg operetta Forbidden Melody.

In 1940, she gave a show-stopping performance as Gladys Bumps in the Rodgers and Hart musical Pal Joey, with Gene Kelly in the lead role and Van Johnson, who was in the chorus, along with future film director Stanley Donen.

Based on their success, Havoc, Johnson and Kelly were beckoned by Hollywood.

Havoc made her first film in 1942, and she began to alternate film roles with returns to the Broadway stage.

From 1942 to 1944, Havoc appeared in 11 films, including My Sister Eileen with Rosalind Russell, and No Time for Love with Claudette Colbert and Fred MacMurray.

She then returned to Broadway in the 1943–44 season, co-starring with Bobby Clark in the Cole Porter musical Mexican Hayride, for which she received the Donaldson Award for best performance by an actress in a supporting role in a musical.

In 1944, Ethel Merman was set to star as the title character in the musical play Sadie Thompson, with a score by Vernon Duke and Howard Dietz, directed and produced by Rouben Mamoulian.

The musical play was based on the short story Rain by W. Somerset Maugham.

The serious nature of the production was a departure from Merman’s string of successful musical comedies.

Moreover, during rehearsals, Merman had difficulties memorizing the lyrics, and she blamed Dietz for his use of sophisticated and foreign words.

She had her husband, newspaper promotion director Bob Levitt, tone down some of the lyrics.

Dietz took exception to Merman’s singing the altered lyrics and gave her an ultimatum to sing his original lyrics or leave the show.

In response, Merman withdrew from the production.

Commentators have speculated that Merman's departure was probably due to her reluctance to assume such a serious role in her first dramatic musical.

Havoc left her starring role in Mexican Hayride, and assumed the role written for Merman.

The production of Sadie Thompson had a difficult out-of-town tryout with songs being deleted and other songs added.

Indeed, even after the Broadway opening, musical numbers continued to be cut and other numbers added.

She last acted on television in 1990 in a story arc on the soap opera General Hospital, and she last appeared on television as herself in interviews in the "Vaudeville" episode of American Masters in 1997 and in "The Rodgers & Hart: Thou Swell, Thou Witty" episode of Great Performances in 1999.

Her elder sister Louise gravitated to burlesque and became the well-known striptease performer Gypsy Rose Lee.

Ellen Evangeline Hovick was born in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.