Biography for
Doris Eaton (I) More at IMDbPro »

Date of Birth

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Doris Eaton was born on March 14, 1904 in Norfolk, Virginia, into a show business family. The young Doris began appearing on stage with her brothers Charles and Joseph and her sisters Mary and Pearl when she was five years old. She made her Broadway debut aside her brother Charles in "Mother Carey's Chickens" in 1917. The following year, the 14-year-old Doris became a Ziegfeld Girl, performing in the "Ziegfeld Follies" of 1918 and 1920 and the "Ziegfeld Midnight Frolic" in 1919. After having served her dance apprenticeship in legendary theatrical impresario Florenz Ziegfeld Jr.'s chorus for three years, she decamped for the movies. She made her screen debut in "At the Stage Door" (1921) in support of Billie Dove.

She moved to England to appear as the lead in three films, Tell Your Children (1922), His Supreme Sacrifice (1922), and The Call of the East (1922). Back in America, she made The Broadway Peacock (1922) with Pearl White and High Kickers (1923) with Jack Cooper and the Gorham Follies Girls.

Doris returned to Broadway in 1924, appearing in the musical "No Other Girl" and the plays "The Sap" and "Excess Baggage." In 1925, she co-starred with Al Jolson in the musical comedy "Big Boy." She then appeared in the comedy "Excess Baggage" in 1927, and the musical comedy "Cross My Heart" the next year. Moving to Hollywood in 1929, she began a career as a featured dancer at the Music Box Review Theater on Sunset Boulevard. It was there that she introduced the song "Singin' in the Rain." Her last appearance on Broadway in a legitimate production was in the comedy "Page Pygmalion" in 1932.

Her career as a dancer began to peter out during the Great Depression, and she became an Arthur Murray dance instructor in 1936. Relocating to the state of Michigan, she eventually became the operator of 18 Arthur Murray dance schools. Eventually, Doris retired to Oklahoma with her husband Paul Tavis, where they operated a quarter horse ranch. When they built their house in Norman, Oklahoma, Doris demanded that the house have a foyer large enough for dancing. Doris still dances in the foyer at night.

"I have my little Victrola there and I play the records and I dance the foxtrot and the waltz and the rumba, though swaying by myself."

Doris has become a regular performer at Broadway's annual AIDS benefit. People express surprise that she was a Ziegfeld Girl.

"It seems that when people find out about it, they're astonished; and possibly because I'm still walking around."

Since her husband passed away in the year 2000, Doris lets people use the ranch to board their horses. Doris jokes, "I call it the Travis Ranch Nursing Home for Horses."

She had dropped out of school to pursue her dance career, but in the 1980s, Travis went back to college and graduated from the University of Oklahoma in 1992. She was named a member of the Phi Beta Kappa honor society while at the university.

Now in her second century, the 101-year-old Doris was quoted as saying dance is the primary reason for her longevity.

Spouse

Trivia

Sister of Pearl Eaton, Mary Eaton and Charles Eaton. In 2003 Doris penned the memoir "The Days We Danced" along with Charles and another brother Joseph, recalling their heyday in vaudeville and on Broadway.

Appears annually at a Broadway AIDS Benefit.

Original member of the Ziegfield Follies of 1919.

Hosted a local TV show in Detroit for seven years and became a millionaire.

During the 30s offers were few and far between for all four of the Eaton entertainers. Pearl, Mary and Charles became alcoholics. Doris says not drinking is one of the reasons for her longevity.

The press referred to the Eaton family as 'The Seven Little Eatons' referring to them being an all showbiz family. This was not true. Evelyn was the eldest child. She had ambitions for the family and pushed her brothers and sisters hard. She was a stage manager and lived her long life in frustration, bitterness and self-pity because her three children did not share her love of the theatre. Brother Robert was never lured into showbiz. Brother Joseph gave up on theatre at an early stage. Sister Pearl (1898 - 1958) split her time between acting and choreographing, becoming quite accomplished at the latter. She was murdered in her Manhatten Beach apartment and the crime is still unsolved. Sister Mary (1901 - 1948) went on to achieve the greatest fame, receiving top billing with Eddie Cantor in Kid Boots. After marrying 'three drunks' she died young of severe metamorphosis of the liver. And brother Charles (1910 - 2004) began very young and was finished in theatre and films by the end of the '30s.

At 103, she still manages her 880 acre ranch.

Her second husband was one of her pupils. They married sometime in the 1940s and did not have any children.

Her first husband was twice her age. He was the producer of the Gorham Follies. He died from a heart attack after they had been married less than one year.

When she was underage, to evade child labor laws, she used the stage names Doris Levant and Lucille Levant. Once she turned 16, she started using her real name.

She is the last surviving Ziegfeld girl.

Doris met her second husband, businessman Paul Travis, while she was teaching dancing at the Arthur Murray dance studios. He was a client. They had a ten-year courtship before finally marrying in 1949.

According to Jamie Brotherton, who wrote a "Classic Images" article on Doris, she engaged in a long romantic relationship with songwriter Nacio Herb Brown (1896-1964), who wrote "Singin' in the Rain" and "Doll Dance" for her, both songs introduced by Doris in "The Hollywood Music Box Revue" in 1927.

Her first husband, stage producer Joe Gorham, who ran the Gorham Theatrical Enterprises of Chicago, featured Doris in his "Gorham Follies" in 1922. They married in January of 1923. The marriage was a brief, but very unhappy one. Her abusive husband died of a heart attack in October of the same year.

In 1929 Doris sang the premier performance of "Singin' In The Rain," a song written for her and which later was immortalized in the play and Gene Kelly movie by the same name.

In 1992 she graduated cum laude from the University of Oklahoma, and was awarded an honorary doctorate from Oakland University in 2004.

In 1998, Doris returned to Broadway and the New Amsterdam Theatre, the same theatre (albeit rebuilt) where she had first appeared in 1918, 80 years earlier, to participate in the Easter Bonnet Competition, a benefit for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. She is an active Honorary President of the Ziegfeld Club, Inc.

Personal Quotes

[on why she survived the end of her stage career better than her sisters] I reached the age of 32 and I took a good look at myself and said, "What's going on here? This is nothing. This is not life". I went back to church and began to study and find myself. I got some inner strength from that.

Where Are They Now

(April 2005) At age 101, pursuing a Masters Degree in Liberal Studies at Oklahoma University.

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