Want to know the best Myrna Loy (1905-1993) movies? How about the worst Myrna Loy movies? Curious about Myrna box office grosses or which Myrna Loy movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Myrna Loy movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences and which got the worst reviews? Well you have come to the right place….because we have all of that information.
At the suggestion of Robwrite, I began researching Myrna Loy’s career about two months ago for this movie page. My knowledge of Myrna Loy was pretty much limited to… she had been in the successful Thin Man series and had appeared in a couple of Cary Grant movies. Other than those two things, I did not really think there was much to really know about Myrna Loy’s career…..boy was I wrong.
“Myrna Loy was one of cinema’s brightest stars. Beautiful, talented, warm, witty, wise and urbane, she swept all before her with a startling succession of box-office hits that lasted from 1932 until 1941, when wartime commitments overtook her career. Adored by moviegoers, Myrna was crowned “Queen of Hollywood” in 1938, with twenty million fans casting their votes in the largest poll of its kind ever conducted. Spencer Tracy was besotted with her, Valentino and Barrymore smitten and President Roosevelt obsessed, whilst Miss Loy had to push Gable off her front-step for “getting fresh”! Her extraordinary profile also supplied plastic surgeons with the most requested image of the 1930s, despite Myrna never having gone under the knife. Loy also managed to royally piss off Hitler by speaking out against his treatment of Jews and, with Chaplin, had the distinction of heading his blacklist”.
“Yet, somehow, Myrna Loy – at her peak more popular than Bette Davis and Katharine Hepburn combined – seems almost forgotten. Whether this can be attributed to her gracious acting style (allowing her leading men to dominate), the lack of scandal in her private life, or the relative scarcity of her films in this country, I’m not sure, but it is a situation that deserves to be rectified”. The previous two paragraphs come from the Myrna Loy forum at Empire.com by Rick 7.
Her IMDb page shows 138 acting credits from 1925-1982. This page will rank Myrna Loy movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Television shows, shorts, cameos and movies and many of her early silent movies were not included in the rankings.
Myrna Loy Movies Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.
Myrna Loy Movies Can Be Ranked 6 Ways In This Table
The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the movies anyway you want.
- Sort Myrna Loy movies by co-stars of her movies
- Sort Myrna Loy movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
- Sort Myrna Loy movies by domestic yearly box office rank
- Sort Myrna Loy movies by how they were received by critics and audiences. 60% rating or higher should indicate a good movie.
- Sort by how many Oscar® nominations and how many Oscar® wins each Myrna Loy movie received.
- Sort Myrna Loy movies by Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score. UMR Score puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.
- Use the sort and search button to make this a very interactive page. For example type in William Powell to see 13 Powell/Loy movies….or type Clark Gable in the search box to bring up all of the Gable/Loy movies….or type in….I think you get the idea.
Stats and Possibly Interesting Things From The Above Myrna LoyTable
- Twenty-nine Myrna Loy movies crossed the magical $100 million domestic gross mark. That is a percentage of 41.42% of her movies listed. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) was her biggest box office hit.
- An average Myrna Loy movie grosses $118.70 million in adjusted box office gross.
- Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter. 52 of Myrna Loy’s movies are rated as good movies…or 74.28% of her movies. After The Thin Man (1936) was her highest rated movie while Parnell (1937) was her lowest rated movie.
- Fifteen Myrna Loy movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 21.42% of her movies.
- Five Myrna Loy movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 7.14% of her movies.
- An average Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score is 40.00. 49 Myrna Loy movies scored higher than that average….or 70.00% of her movies. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) got the the highest UMR Score while Just Tell Me What You Want (1980) got the lowest UMR Score.
Possibly Interesting Facts About Myrna Loy
1. Loy had 80 screen credits before finally becoming a star with the release of the low budget surprise hit….1934’s The Thin Man. This UMR page looks at her career from 1933-1980, with a few of her pre-1933 releases.
2. During her early years…..Loy appeared in the first ever European/American co-production…1925’s Ben-Hur…..she appeared in the first movie to use a movie score…..1926’s Don Juan…..she appeared in the first talkie….1927’s The Jazz Singer……and she appeared in the first ever filmed operetta….1929’s The Desert Song.
3. Myrna Loy appeared in over 120 movies, but never received an Oscar® nomination or a Golden Globe® nomination for any of her acting roles. She did receive an honorary Oscar® for career achievement in 1991.
4. In 1921, Loy posed for Harry Winebrenner’s statue titled “Spiritual,” which remained in front of Venice High School throughout the 20th century and can be seen in the opening scenes of the 1978 film Grease.
5. Gangster John Dillinger was shot to death after leaving a screening of the 1934 film Manhattan Melodrama which starred Loy, Clark Gable and William Powell.
6. Loy and William Powell appeared in 14 movies together. 6 times they appeared as Nick and Nora Charles in The Thin Man movie series (1934-1947). When looking at the table above….8 of their movies finished in Loy’s Top Ten according to critics and audiences.
7. Check out the list of co-stars for Loy…..Clark Gable (7 movies), Cary Grant (3 movies), Warner Baxter (3 movies), Spencer Tracy (2 films), and with one film….James Stewart, Jack Lemmon, Paul Newman, Frederich March, Will Rogers, Charlton Heston, Tyrone Power, and of course Burt Reynolds.
8. The first part of her career was in silent movies…she was typecast in exotic roles, often as a vamp or a woman of Asian descent…..her first film her character was called Vamp…..these roles kind of solidified her exotic non-America image…..which is strange as she was born and raised in Montana.
9. Loy’s big break? Loy attended a Hollywood party with director W.S. Dyke. At the party Dyke detected a wit and sense of humor that Loy’s films had not revealed. He then chose Loy for the Nora Charles role in The Thin Man. The success of The Thin Man changed how Hollywood viewed her, and her roles got bigger and better.
10. With the outbreak of World War II, she abandoned her acting career to focus on the war effort and worked closely with the Red Cross. She helped run a Naval Auxiliary Canteen and toured frequently to raise funds.
Check out Myrna Loy‘s career compared to current and classic actors. Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.
Not enough stats for you?….Then check out 37 Myrna Loy worldwide adjusted grosses
- After the Thin Man (1936) $355.90 million in adjusted box office
- Animal Kingdom (1932) $58.10 million in adjusted box office
- Another Thin Man (1939) $267.40 million in adjusted box office
- The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer (1947) $384.70 million in adjusted box office
- The Bad Man (1930) $84.00 million in adjusted box office
- The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) $859.60 million in adjusted box office
- Bride of the Regiment (1930) $69.70 million in adjusted box office
- The Desert Song (1929) $232.20 million in adjusted box office
- Double Wedding (1937) $264.40 million in adjusted box office
- Evelyn Prentice (1934) $122.30 million in adjusted box office
- The Great Ziegfeld (1936) $525.20 million in adjusted box office
- I Love You Again (1940) $185.30 million in adjusted box office
- Isle of Escape (1930) $37.10 million in adjusted box office
- Libeled Lady (1936) $306.00 million in adjusted box office
- Love Crazy (1941) $200.70 million in adjusted box office
- Lucky Night (1939) $130.20 million in adjusted box office
- Manhattan Melodrama (1934) $129.00 million in adjusted box office
- Man-Proof (1938) $136.90 million in adjusted box office
- The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932) $68.30 million in adjusted box office
- Men In White (1934) $152.20 million in adjusted box office
- Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (1948) $197.50 million in adjusted box office
- New Morals For Old (1932) $36.60 Night Flight (1933) $112.30 million in adjusted box office
- Noah’s Ark (1928) $191.00 million in adjusted box office
- Parnell (1937) $204.70 million in adjusted box office
- Pay As You Enter (1928) $11.30 million in adjusted box office
- Petticoat Fever (1936) $121.90 million in adjusted box office
- The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933) $97.20 million in adjusted box office
- Shadow of the Thin Man (1941) $224.10 million in adjusted box office
- The Show of Shows (1929) $209.90 million in adjusted box office
- Song of the Thin Man (1947) $142.40 million in adjusted box office
- Test Pilot (1938) $487.60 million in adjusted box office
- The Thin Man Goes Home (1945) $193.90 million in adjusted box office
- The Thin Man, The (1934) $159.90 million in adjusted box office
- Too Hot To Handle (1938) $299.20 million in adjusted box office
- The Truth About Youth (1930) $37.00 million in adjusted box office
- Under a Texas Moon (1930) $107.50 million in adjusted box office
- Whipshaw (1935) $97.60 million in adjusted box office
- Wife vs Secretary (1936) $232.70 million in adjusted box office
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“Adored by moviegoers, Myrna was crowned “Queen of Hollywood” in 1938, with twenty million fans casting their votes in the largest poll of its kind ever conducted.” SOURCE Cogerson Lead-in above.
The Thin Woman undoubtedly had a degree of popularity in her day but before being swept away by hyperbole about it we should perhaps put it into perspective by taking account of the information in Part One of this post and also by thinking about the following additional qualifying factors.
1/It is an accepted fact that the results of opinion polls can be manipulated to give the kind of results that the vested interests who commission the polls are looking for.
2/In the recent US elections there were opinion polls that were downgraded [according to pollsters’ guru Nate Silver] because they were either Democratic or Republican “leaning”-ie they had connections to the two major parties and always gave results that were much more favorable to their own respective employers than did all other ‘unbiased’ polls. President Trump for example claimed that the polls that were most favorable to the Democrats had been manipulated by sampling an excessive number of Democrats and too few Republicans.
3/Apart from over-sampling biased groups and demographics, polls can also be manipulated by for example giving limited and ‘loaded’ choices and selecting crucially-favorable years/periods for the conducting of the polls. FACTS: The poll quoted above was commissioned by MGM The Thin Woman’s own studio in the 1937/38 period when 5 Loy films were going the rounds: Double Wedding; Parnell; Test Pilot; Too Hot to Handle; Man Proof.
4/As usual in those movies Thins was surround by a whole host of other Mega-to- at-least-important stars of the time: her perennials Bill Powell and [thrice] King Gable; Rosalind Russell; Franchot Tone; Walter Pidgeon; and the Great Spencer Tracy. However in the gush of cherrypicked hyperbole that we are given it is not mentioned that Parnell was such a commercial flop that Gable was reluctant to do another costume drama or biopic ever again and apparently in fact had to be strongly coaxed to do GWTW. [SOURCE: Wikipedia].
5/Here actually is what apparently MGM itself thought of The Thin Woman’s status even within her own studio AROUND THE TIME OF THAT POLL: “8. Melvyn Douglas and billing. Douglas – “Well, Freddie Bartholomew had first billing in Captains Courageous and that drove Spencer Tracy mad. I was billed fourth – and couldn’t have cared less. Joan Crawford once explained to me she was over Clark Gable and William Powell but under Norma Shearer. Powell was under Jean Harlow but above Bob Montgomery and [LAST] Myrna Loy. SOURCE: Melvyn Douglas UMR page.
6/Whatever weight one does actually place on the MGM-commissioned poll in the 1937-38 period “one swallow doesn’t make a summer” and HISTORICALLY OVERALLThins has sadly done relatively poorly in the recognized prestige popularity polls of any longevity. The acclaimed “Bible” of such polls has long been Quigley and The Thin Woman only appeared twice in its Top 10, indeed in just the afore-mentioned 1937/38 period. Even Bette Davis with whom we are told that Thins wiped the floor appeared 4 times in the Quigley Top 10 during Thins’ heyday period and Bette [whilst popular to a degree like Myrna] was noted more for being a great actress than for being a box-office “Queen”. Thins’ best friend my Joan was ranked 5 times consecutively in the Top 10.
MYRNA LOY
1937 Ranked 10th
1938 7th
BETTE DAVIS
1939 Ranked 6th
1940 9th
1941 8th
1944 10th
JOAN CRAWFORD
1932 Ranked 3rd
1933 10th
1934 6th
1935 5th
1936 7th
7. Bottom line. The historically renowned Quigley clearly wasn’t buying into The Thin Woman “Queen” hyperbole; and indeed in even 1937/38 Shirley Temple, Sonja Heaney and Jane Withers were all ranked above Thins in the Top 10.
8. In fact Quigley has designated the following as the greatest female box office champions of all time on the basis of their frequency of Top 10 appearances
Mary Pickford 13
Betty Grable 10
Doris Day 10
Barbra Streisand 10
Julia Roberts 10
“FAKE NEWS”/MISINFORMATION “NOBODY cared about Desiree or Brando’s performance as Napoleon.” SOURCE Rating the Movie Stars 1983 page 57
FACTS:
(1) “ a tale—-Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.” William Shakespeare: Macjoel.
(2) Desiree was the 16th biggest box office hit of 1954 grossing domestically a whopping almost $260 million dollars and out-grossing for example the much-lauded other Brando release that year the now-classic On the Waterfront; outdoing the megastar trio-laden Sabrina with Bogie/Golden Holden/Audrey Hepburn; and surpassing at the box office as well each of the then-2-latest movies in the mega-grossing Martin & Lewis film series Living it Up and Three Ring Circus. SOURCE: UMR The Greatest Box Office Hits of 1954
(3) “Brando’s gave us the greatest [screen] Napoleon ever!” Lord Laurence Olivier British Actor Peer of the Realm, theatrical icon and one of AFI all-time 25 Greatest male screen legends.
“OTHER PEOPLE’s NONEY”
“Myrna Loy —- at her peak more popular than Bette Davis and Katharine Hepburn combined” SOURCE: COGERSON LEAD- IN ABOVE
FACTS
(1) Now tell us the nursery rhyme about Goldilocks and the 3 Bears.
(2) “7. Check out the list of co-stars for Loy…..[William Powell 14 times]Clark Gable (7 movies), Cary Grant (3 movies), Warner Baxter (3 movies), Spencer Tracy (2 films), and with one film….James Stewart, Jack Lemmon, Paul Newman, Frederich [ie Fredric] March, Will Rogers, Charlton Heston, Tyrone Power, and of course Burt Reynolds” SOURCE:COGERSON POSSIBLY INTERESTING FACTS ABOVE.
BOB ROY SIMONE SIGNORET PAGE 27 NOV
“Yves [Montand] gets no credit for that one above [in the Cogerson co-star links column] even though he had the anchor role of Inspector Graziani”.
COGERSON REPLY 28 NOV
“Yves Montand gets mentioned in the co-star link numerous times….which goes to the saying….”variety is the spice of life”.
Really?
1/MOVIE: Love Me Tonight
STAR PAGE: Jeanette MacDonald [2nd billed and female lead]
NEXT BILLED: Maurice Chevalier- top billed alone above the title]Charlie Ruggles [3rd lead]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN Myrna Loy – alone
2/MOVIE: Arrowsmith
STAR PAGE: Ronald Colman
NEXT BILLED: Helen Hayes/Richard Bennett [2nd and 3rd leads]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Myrna Loy – alone
3/MOVIE: A Connecticut Yankee
STAR PAGE: Will Rogers
NEXT BILLED: William Farnum/Frank Albertson [2nd and 3rd leads]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Myrna Loy & Maureen O’ Sullivan only
4/MOVIE: Cheaper by The Dozen
STAR PAGE: Clifton Webb
NEXT BILLED: Jeanne Crain [2nd lead]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Myrna Loy – alone
5/MOVIE: The Ambassador’s Daughter
STAR PAGE: Olivia De Havilland
NEXT BILLED: John Forsyth [2nd and male lead]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Myrna Loy & Edward Arnold only
6/MOVIE: Midnight Lace
STAR PAGE: Doris Day
NEXT BILLED: Rex Harrison and John Gavin [2nd and 3rd leads]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Rex Harrison & Myrna Loy only
7/MOVIE: The Mask of Fu Manchu
STAR PAGE: Boris Karloff
NEXT BILLED: Lewis Stone/Karen Morley [2nd & 3rd leads]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Myrna Loy – alone
8/MOVIE: The End
STAR PAGE: Burt Reynolds
NEXT BILLED: Sally Field/Dom DeLuise [3rd and 2nd leads
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Myrna Loy & Sally Field only
9/MOVIE; Animal Kingdom
STAR PAGE: Leslie Howard [2nd]
NEXT BILLED: Ann Harding [Top]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Myrna Loy – alone
10/MOVIE: Wife v Secretary
STAR PAGE: Clark Gable
NEXT BILLED: Jean Harlow [2nd and female lead]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Myrna Loy & James Stewart only
11/MOVIE: Night Flight
STAR PAGE: Clark Gable
TOP BILLED: John Barrymore & Helen Hayes [Gable 4th]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Lionel Barrymore & Myrna Loy [Loy last out of 6]
12/MOVIE: The Devil to Pay
STAR PAGE: Ronald Colman
NEXT BILLED: Frederick Kerr/Loretta Young [2nd and 3rd leads]
CREDIT IN CO-STAR LINK COLUMN: Loretta Young & Myrna Loy only
CLARK GABLE PAGE – some “variety” would have been nice
1/Test Pilot -Gable/Loy/Tracy/Marjorie Main
Co-star link names: Tracy/Loy
2/Too Hot to Handle-Gable/Loy/Walter Pidgeon
Co-star link: Loy only
3/Wife v Secretary-Gable/Harlow/Loy/Mary Robinson
Co-star link: Loy/Stewart
4/Parnell-Gable/Loy/Edmund Gwenn
Loy only
5/Men in White-Gable/Loy/Jean Hersholt
Co-star link: Loy only
6/Manhattan Melodrama: Gable/Powell/Loy/Leo Carrillo
Co-star link: Powell/Loy
7/Night Flight-John Barrymore/Helen Hayes/Gable/Robert Montgomery/Loy
Co-star link: Loy/Lionel Barrymore
LOY Co-star link listings-7 out of a whopping 7
SIMONE SIGNORET PAGE – at last some “Variety”!
1/The Crucible-Simone Signoret/Yves Montand
Co-star link column MENTION: Montand
2/The Confession-Montand/Signoret
Co-star link column MENTION: Montand
3/Police Python 357-Montand/Signoret
Co-star link column MENTION-Montand
4/Sleeping Car Murder-Montand/Signoret
Co-star link column MENTION: Catherine Allegret
MONTAND co-star link MENTIONS: 3 out of a modest 4
Hey Bob….thanks for breaking down these Loy co-star lists….some of the links were done automatically….while others only have Loy because at the time she was one of the ones that had an UMR page. WoC is working on some stuff as we continue to work our way through our current “completely screwed up” database that will make even more stuff automatic. The bad news for your concerns is the more popular page is…the higher the link gets rated….and she…even you downplay her….has a solid fan base that has made that a very popular page. Good information……and now I go to sleep…gotta be up in 3 hours…as it is a very early day tomorrow. FYI….My teaching hours are starting to close in on my grocery retail hours…..with the negative of the pay having such a huge difference.
Note Bill Powell is credited below for 1956’s The Ambassador’s Daughter AND on Olivia’s page but I can find no reference in any other source to Bill being in that movie and in fact his last movie is stated as being in1955.
That said mistakes in Bruce’s highly comprehensive tables are always very Thin on the ground – no pun intended!
Thanks Bob…that error has been fixed on this page, Olivia’s page and on our Edward Arnold page…..I seem to get The Ambassador’s Daughter and The Senator Was Indiscreet mixed up. Loy has a cameo in The Senator Was Indiscreet which starred Powell…but Powell does not appear in The Ambassador’s Daughter. So good catch. Thanks again.
Lee Phelps was in 13 films with Myrna and Sherry Hall was in 10.
Hey Dan. Like Harry….Lee getting a second shout out. Good stuff.