Jessie Busley
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Busley was born in Albany, New York.[1] The wife of an Albany theater owner took her to New York, where she met Charles Frohman.[2]
Career
Busley's first Broadway appearance came in 1888.[1] She starred on stage in over 25 Frohman productions in the first 15 years of her career. In June 1930, she appeared on film for the first time in The Devil's Parade A Musical Revue set in Hades, a 10-minute film short by Warner Bros. Pictures, alongside actress Joan Blondell.
Busley went on to appear in such films as Brother Rat and Brother Rat and a Baby. In 1939, she appeared alongside Kay Francis, James Stephenson, and Humphrey Bogart in King of the Underworld. The next year she appeared in Humphrey Bogart's It All Came True.
Personal life and death
Several months after they were married, Ernest Joy tried to shoot a theatrical press agent in a jealous rage after he saw him leaving a theater with Busley. Word of the shot was reported in the news of the time and the press agent left town. Later that same year, Busley and Joy separated after it was reported that she had him arrested for "annoying her". All charges were dropped when she did not testify against him.[citation needed]
On August 1, 1908, The New York Times reported that Busley had sent two men to beat her husband Joy, whom she intended to divorce, with one of them hitting him over the head with an iron bar, leaving him hospitalized. The article said that the couple had frequent quarrels, and finished by noting that she had last appeared in The Bishop's Carriage, and "is well known as an actress but has had more success in the south and west then [sic] in this city".[3]
Busley died on April 20, 1950, in St. Vincent's Hospital in New York City, aged 80.[1]
