Virginia Field - Overview

Margaret St. John Field (4 November 1917 – 2 January 1992), known professionally as Virginia Field, was a British-born film actress. The niece of stage actress and director Auriol Lee, she took her first film role as a teenager in the 1934 British mystery-comedy The Lady Is Willing before signing a Hollywood contract.

Field first went to the US to appear in David O. Selznick's Little Lord Fauntleroy (1936). In the late 1930s, she appeared in various parts in 20th Century Fox's Mr. Moto film series. Field then played a ballerina alongside Vivien Leigh in Waterloo Bridge (1940), an estranged wife in Dorothy Arzner's Dance, Girl, Dance (1940) and Stuart-era performer Nell Gwyn in the historical Western Hudson's Bay (1941). She also performed in the noir genre, with films like Repeat Performance (1947), Dial 1119 (1950) and Appointment with a Shadow (1957). She made frequent appearances on television in the 1950s and '60s.

Field married three times. Her spouses included actors Willard Parker and Paul Douglas, with whom she had a daughter, as well as composer and musician Howard Grode. She died of cancer on 2 January 1992 and was cremated, with her ashes scattered at sea. Field has a star at 1751 Vine Street on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles, dedicated 8 February 1960.