Evelyn Keyes, 91; Actress Starred in Dozens of Films

Evelyn Keyes, 91, a leading lady of dozens of Hollywood films who wryly dismissed much of her career, noting that she was most remembered for a bit part as Scarlett O'Hara's younger sister Suellen in "Gone With the Wind," died July 4 at a care facility in Montecito, Calif. She had uterine cancer.

Ms. Keyes wrote two memoirs that brushed by her appearances in more than 40 movies. Instead, she spoke at length about her marriages to director John Huston and bandleader Artie Shaw, as well as sexual conquests that included Kirk Douglas, David Niven and Anthony Quinn.

"I was always interested in the man of the moment," she once said, "and there were so many such moments."

She was discovered by producer Cecil B. DeMille, then had a long career at Columbia studios in the 1940s and early 1950s. She never reached the front rank of performers but proved a versatile and appealing female lead.

Her light touch graced comedies ("Here Comes Mr. Jordan") and musicals ("The Jolson Story," "A Thousands and One Nights"), and she could convincingly adapt to the required accent, whether Georgia peach ("Gone With the Wind") or English cockney ("Ladies in Retirement").

She also proved more than adaptable to hard-boiled dramas ("99 River Street," "Johnny O'Clock") and several westerns, despite her allergic reaction to horses. Among her favorite, if lesser-known films, was "The Prowler" (1951), about a woman seduced and harassed by a rogue cop (Van Heflin).

Still, she told film scholar Eddie Muller: "I never got the part, the starring role that sends you shooting way up there, into the top ranks. I thought that would come. I obviously wasn't going to marry and have a family and give it all up.

"I was married, sure, but those weren't marriages -- they were legalized love affairs. So we wouldn't have the big stink -- Oh my God, they're living together! So what do you do? You get married."

Evelyn Louise Keyes was born Nov. 20, 1916, in Port Arthur, Tex., where her father was an oil-platform laborer. She was a toddler when he died because of an infected carbuncle on his chin.

Her mother moved her and four older siblings to Atlanta, where she described a neglectful upbringing. She found pleasure only in movies. Determined to crash Hollywood, she began dancing as "Goldie Keyes" and found her way to Los Angeles in 1936.

She was spotted by DeMille, who placed her under exclusive contract and cast her in minor parts in his major productions, including "The Buccaneer" (1938), with Fredric March, and "Union Pacific" (1939), with Joel McCrea.

She said a breakthrough eluded her because of her ill-timed affair with Anthony Quinn, who soon became DeMille's son-in-law.