“Where there’s a beautiful woman in the dock, it makes a Criminal Court trial so much more amusing!” --Thriller writer Augustus Muir, The Bronze Door
Here's a bit about a beauty named Madeline Webb, the true story of the femme fatale who found herself living in New York in “starlet survival mode,” taking off her clothes a lot more often than her folks back in Oklahoma would ever guess, and getting herself involved in murder.…
The trial of the strangely attractive, asymmetrical beauty, Miss Madeline Webb, two women in one – look at that curious face, damaged in a car accident -- is one I was going to tell you about, only I discovered it has been well told at least twice. A Clews reader recently gave me two links to this fascinating case; thanks Lona.
Here’s the lead on the version recently written by the New York Daily News –
Madeline Webb pranced into New York in 1939 with stars in her eyes.
The tall brunette, an actress and dancer, was regarded as one of the prettiest and most talented girls in her hometown of Stillwater, Okla.
She was certain that fame awaited her in Gotham.
New York was waiting, all right….
Read the rest here.
But decades before that, in June 1942, Time Magazine printed an ode to Madeline Webb from an altogether different point of view.
Little Guy's Lady
The world never appreciated Eli Shonbrun. He was a little guy with plenty of talent, he figured, but the world never gave him a decent break.
That was the way he saw it.
Just after he was married, his job folded up on him. He went to his greasy Uncle Murray Hirschl, who was a schlemiel with a dirty reputation in the jewelry business.
Big-hearted Uncle Murray took him into "partnership." The pay: $10 a week. With all Eli's talent. ... One day he held out a little of the dough he had collected on jewelry, and he was arrested for larceny. That was the kind of break Eli got.
Eli dropped the jewelry business — he had been let off with a suspended sentence — and tried night club singing. His wife took their kid and left him.
Then he met Madeline.
Madeline Webb lived on the soiled fringes of Broadway. She had had a shot at Hollywood. Before that she had been a college girl back in Stillwater, Okla.
She was good-looking, the pouty kind with heavy, half-open red lips and a little girl's big, wide eyes and a kind of Hedy Lamarr hairdo. Two of her teeth had been knocked out in an automobile accident, but she was good enough to be a model for a while and even a peep-show dancer at the World's Fair.
Eli fell hard. Madeline fell for him too. He was not bad looking in a Broadway way.
So Eli and Madeline lived together in inexpensive hotels, skipping out when they got too broke to pay the bill. That happened every so often. Finally they had hardly a nickel for a cup of coffee.
They talked it over, a little desperate now, with a pal they had picked up, John Cullen, who was a West Side punk with a petty police record from way back. They consulted also with the greaseball, dirty Uncle Murray Hirschl. Noise.
A couple of days later employes at the Hotel Sutton in Manhattan heard the blaring radio in Eli and Madeline's room. The funny part was that it blared all one afternoon, through the night and into the next morning. Finally someone took a pass key, opened the door to look in.….
I have to cut it off before I violate their copyright. Read the rest here.
An account of the Madeline Webb murder trial also appeared in book form in Stillwater History by D. Earl Newsom (Amazon link).
So let us add Madeline Webb to the rolls as one of those many beautiful women who committed very naughty deeds and yet still managed to star in a cinematic ending.
Here is a link I found that paints a completely different picture of the lady in question. I know she was probably guilty, but the TIME article seems a little skewed.....
http://www.tulsaworld.com/webextra/itemsofinterest/centennial/centennial_storypage.asp?ID=071103_1_A4_spanc11346
Posted by: AvidReader | January 06, 2011 at 12:33 PM