Lynn Bari Documentary - Hollywood Walk of Fame

Lynn Bari was a film actress who specialized in playing sultry, statuesque man-killers in roughly 150 movies for 20th Century Fox from the early 1930s through the 1940s. Early years Bari was born in 1919 in Roanoke, Virginia to John Maynard Fisher, a native of Tennessee, and his wife Marjorie Halpen of New York. When her father died a year later her mother moved the family to Lynchburg. Here Bari&mother met and married the Reverend Robert Bitzer, a Religious Science minister. Assigned a position with his church in Boston, Bitzer moved the family to Massachusetts. Bari later recalled other children at school in Boston made life miserable for her brother and her, making constant fun of their obvious Southern accents. She determined to eliminate hers, becoming involved with amateur theatrics and taking elocution lessons. Bari was enthusiastic when at the age of 13 she was told her stepfather had been reassigned to Los Angeles, where he later became the head of the Institute of Religious Science. Her stage name, selected as Lynn Barrie while at dramatic school at 14, is a composite of theater actress Lynn Fontanne and author J.M. Barrie. After reading a story about the Italian city of Bari, she decided to change the spelling. Career Bari was one of 14 young women "launched on the trail of film stardom" August 6, 1935 when they each received a six-month contract with 20th Century Fox after spending 18 months in the company&training school. The contracts included a studio...