Joan Peers
2 credits on HibingeTV
American film actress of the early sound era. A brief screen career in the late 1920s and early 1930s included the heroine role of Mary Rainey in Frank Capra's Rain or Shine (1930). She left films by the mid-1930s.
Acted In
Drama, Music
A pre-Code backstage musical and the directorial debut of Rouben Mamoulian, who brought his innovative theatrical staging to the early sound film. Helen Morgan plays Kitty Darling, a fading burlesque star who tries to save her convent-educated daughter April (Joan Peers) from following in her footsteps. Mamoulian's extensive use of a moving camera and simultaneous sound tracks was technically groundbreaking for the early sound era. The film's copyright expired on January 1, 2025, entering the public domain.
Drama · Music
Applause
1929 - as April Darling
Comedy, Drama
Frank Capra's circus comedy, adapted from the hit Broadway musical. When her father dies, Mary Rainey (Joan Peers) inherits his struggling show, kept afloat by the manic clown Smiley Johnson (vaudevillian Joe Cook, recreating his stage role) until a climactic fire threatens to end it all. Originally shot as a full musical, the numbers were cut before release to dodge the public's backlash against the genre, leaving a fast-paced comedy that was a hit for the young Columbia Pictures. The film is in the public domain.
Comedy · Drama
Rain or Shine
1930 - as Mary Rainey