Carole Landis was a pinup model and up and coming actress in the 1930s and 40s. She began her career as a hula dancer but later dyed her hair platinum and moved to Hollywood with $100 in her pocket. Her film debut was in 1937 at the age of eighteen as an extra in A Star is Born, but hit it big as the lead cave girl in One Million B.C. She acted in a string of successful movies in the 1940s but was often engaged in heated love affairs, including one with Darryl F. Zanuck of Twentieth Century-Fox. When she left Zanuck, her career took a nosedive. Landis would have a total of four husbands in her short life. She joined a USO troupe that toured England and North Africa, performing with fellow actor Kay Francis, dancer Mitzi Mayfair and comedienne Martha Raye. Landis wrote multiple media articles about her experiences, as well as the 1944 book Four Jills in a Jeep. The book would later become a movie starring her former USO compatriots. Towards the end of her life she entered into an illicit affair with actor Rex Harrison who was married to actress Lilli Palmer. Landis wanted him to leave his wife, but like all of these stories, he refused to do so. Unable to tolerate the turmoil, she committed suicide by overdosing on Seconal, according to the Los Angeles coroner. Harrison discovered her body. Landis family has questioned the coroners ruling.
