Film Career
Payton first gained notice in the 1949 film noir Trapped, co-starring Lloyd Bridges. In 1950, she was given the opportunity to make a screen test for John Huston's production of the forthcoming MGM crime drama The Asphalt Jungle. She wasn't chosen and the part of the sultry mistress of a mob connected lawyer went to Marilyn Monroe.
After being screen-tested by James Cagney and his producer brother William, Payton starred with Cagney in the violent noir thriller Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye in 1950. William Cagney was so smitten with Payton's sensual appeal and beauty that her contract was drawn as a joint agreement between William Cagney Productions and Warner Bros. who together saw fit to bestow on Payton a salary of $5,000 a week; a large sum for an actress yet to demonstrate star power at the box-office.
For a relative newcomer, in Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye, Payton more than managed to hold her own among a cast of Hollywood veterans and alongside a super-star like Cagney himself. Her portrayal of the hardened, seductive girlfriend, whom Cagney’s character ultimately double-crosses, was critically praised in newspaper reviews of the movie. Her acting skills were recognized and her significant screen charisma widely acknowledged. Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye was the highpoint in Payton’s career, the moment in time she was christened as a player with bonafide star power.
Her other screen appearances opposite Gary Cooper in Dallas, and Gregory Peck in Only the Valiant, both westerns, were lackluster productions where her roles were no more than window dressing for the hero and did little to highlight her skills as an actress. Payton's career decline began with the 1951 horror film Bride of the Gorilla, co-starring Raymond Burr.
Over time, her very public displays of excess partying, drinking and liaisons with men of dubious reputation, tarnished her credibility as an actress on a serious career track, and ultimately alienated the very Hollywood power brokers whose good will she needed to court in order to have a viable movie career. Through it all however, Payton held to a childlike belief in her Hollywood stardom, which in her mind had never faded. She was unable to acknowledge that her once-promising career had crashed and burned, never to be resurrected.
Read more about this topic: Barbara Payton
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