- Born
- Died
- Birth nameBeatrice Sofia Mathilda Peterson
- Nickname
- Beatrice Schute
- Height5′ 6″ (1.68 m)
- Hillary Brooke's image as the epitome of glacial, regal, upper-class British gentility is muted somewhat by the fact that she was born Beatrice Sofia Mathilda Peterson to a middle-class American family in Long Island, New York. She was the sister of actor Arthur Peterson, best-known as the demented "Major" on the soap-opera satire Soap (1977). Always a beauty, she had a successful career as a photographer's model before breaking into show business. Her "British" accent came about when she realized that she was just one of innumerable tall, good-looking blondes vying for roles, and needed something to make her stand out among them. She came up with affecting a British accent and it worked; she began to get more and more roles that called for a "British" blonde, so she kept the accent.
Her film debut was in New Faces of 1937 (1937), in which -- billed as "Beatrice Schute" -- she played a showgirl. She began working steadily in films in the early 1940s, and appeared in such major productions as The Woman in Green (1945), The Fuller Brush Man (1948), The Philadelphia Story (1940), Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941), Wake Island (1942), Jane Eyre (1943) and The Enchanted Cottage (1945), in addition to the usual run of "B" westerns and thrillers in which many up-and-coming young actresses had to put in time. In the early 1950s she began appearing on television including 23 appearances on The Abbott and Costello Show (1952) as "Hillary Brooke", the object of Lou Costello's affections. She had worked previously with the duo in their second color film, Abbott and Costello Meet Captain Kidd (1952), in which she played a pirate chief.
She had no compunctions about taking a pie in the face, a vase on the head, a pratfall, or tussling with Bingo the chimp, and more than held her own. She also had a similar role as the girlfriend of Vern Albright (Charles Farrell) in My Little Margie (1952) and alternated between television and film roles in the 1950s. One of her better-known roles was as little David MacLean (Jimmy Hunt)'s mother, Mary, who is taken over by the Martians in the sci-fi classic Invaders from Mars (1953). She also played Doris Day's character's best friend in The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), and, the next year, had her final film role in Spoilers of the Forest (1957), after which she turned exclusively to television.
She retired from the film industry in 1960, after marrying film executive Raymond A. Klune, and died in Bonsall, California, aged 84, in 1999.- IMDb Mini Biography By: frankfob2@yahoo.com
- SpousesRaymond A. Klune(March 12, 1960 - September 24, 1988) (his death)Jack Voglin(December 17, 1941 - July 21, 1948) (divorced)Allen Schute(November 27, 1936 - October 3, 1940) (divorced)
- ChildrenCarol V. Klune
- RelativesArthur Peterson(Sibling)
- Although she spoke with an English accent, she was not British; she was actually from Astoria, New York. She said that she cultivated that accent at the beginning of her career in order to set her apart from all the other tall blondes she would be competing with for roles. The tactic worked so well that producers who hired "the blonde with the British accent" expected to hear a blonde with a British accent on the screen, so she was forced to use the accent whenever she worked, and wound up using it all the time, even off screen.
- Producers tended to think of her as too intelligent and self-possessed to be sexy, so she never got the lead and seldom got the man. However, she displayed a real flair for comedy and appeared with Bob Hope (Monsieur Beaucaire (1946)) and Red Skelton (The Fuller Brush Man (1948)) and, of course, was a regular as Lou Costello's semi-girlfriend on The Abbott and Costello Show (1952). Some other notable pictures in which she was cast include The Philadelphia Story (1940), Lady in the Dark (1944), Jane Eyre (1943), Ministry of Fear (1944), The Enchanted Cottage (1945) and The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956).
- Attended and graduated from Columbia University in New York City.
- She is best remembered for her incongruous role as Lou Costello's girlfriend (of sorts) on The Abbott and Costello Show (1952) as well as Vernon Albright (Charles Farrell)'s girlfriend on My Little Margie (1952). Both shows are still seen today in syndication and on home video. With her regal British accent--even though she was not British--and upper-class, ladylike demeanor, Brooke was treated as a goddess by Costello and Bud Abbott on the show and was seldom subject to the usual slapstick other actresses on the show were. Even off screen, she was treated the same way by the team. They were notorious for their love of practical jokes, which they often played on cast and crew (and which were often, as could be expected from veteran burlesque comics like them, somewhat risqué). However, Brooke was never on the receiving end of any of their pranks even though, as she once noted in an interview, she would love to have been.
- In The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), she played the character Jan Peterson, a friend of Doris Day's character. Peterson was Brooke's real birth name.
- I never thought I was a great actress. Maybe I would have been better if I'd worked harder at it. But I really enjoyed my career and the wonderful people I worked with.
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