Swimmer and Movie Star Esther Williams dies at 91.
Esther Williams who was popularly known as the ‘Million Dollar Mermaid’ on the silver screen, died in her sleep last Thursday at her home in Los Angeles at the age of 91.
MGM studios had discovered Williams while she was still a teen and promised her a good career in the film industry just like ice skater Sonja Henie, only with her embraced fame to be surrounded by water rather than ice.
Esther Williams had once said, “Know when to get out of show business while you’re still ahead in the industry.” And she did it. When she was 74-years-old people used to ask her about her decision to leave showbiz. Her reply was straight, “When you’ve been treated like I was at MGM, who wants to do five-minute cameos on television sitcoms? That’s why you never saw me on a ‘Love Boat’ episode. Those shows are for an army of has-beens and would-be stars.”
Based on the swimwear styles she had made famous during the 1940s and 1950s were turned into her own swimwear line by designer Williams. She said, “When I first came to MGM, my swimsuits were the first ones the studio wardrobe department ever had to design.”
The period of the 1940s was not at all an easy time to wear swimsuits for the Olympic stars. She had been slated to compete in the 1940 Olympic Games in Finland but the event was cancelled due to the war pressures and Adolf Hitler.
She starred with several top-class actors including Mickey Rooney, Peter Lawford, Red Skeleton and Frank Sinatra. According to her, the true screen test was with Clark Gable when she replaced Lana Turner when she left for New York to marry bandleader Artie Shaw.
After several failed marriages she spent her later life travelling from Brentwood, California, which was her home, to New York to oversee the swimwear line. She had been married to her fourth husband, Edward Bell, since Oct. 24, 1994, at the time of her death.