Norma Shearer

Shearer had two children with Thalberg, Irving Junior (1930–1988) and Katherine (1935–2006). Before they were married, Shearer converted to Judaism so that she could marry Thalberg.

One week after the marriage, The Jazz Singer was released. The first feature-length motion picture with sound, it effectively changed the cinematic landscape overnight and signaled the end of the silent motion picture era. It also spelled the end of many silent careers, and Shearer was determined hers would not be one of them. Her brother, Douglas Shearer, was instrumental in the development of sound at MGM, and every care was taken to prepare her for the microphone.

Her first talkie, The Trial of Mary Dugan (1929), turned out to be a tremendous success. Shearer's "medium pitched, fluent, flexible Canadian accent, not quite American but not at all foreign" was critically applauded, and thereafter widely imitated by other actresses, nervous about succeeding in talkies. Despite the popularity of her subsequent early talking films, The Last of Mrs. Cheyney and Their Own Desire (both 1929), Shearer feared the public would soon tire of her "good girl" image, and took the advice of friend and co-star Ramón Novarro to visit an unknown photographer named George Hurrell. There she took a series of sensual portraits which convinced her husband that she could play the lead in MGM's racy new film, The Divorcee (1930). Read Less