Corinne Anita Loos was an American actress, novelist, playwright and screenwriter. In 1912, she became the first female staff screenwriter in Hollywood, when D. W. Griffith put her on the payroll at Triangle Film Corporation. She is best known for her 1925 comic novel, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, and her 1951 Broadway adaptation of Colette's novella Gigi.
1916 portrait of Loos
Stylized cover drawing of Anita Loos by Frank Walts on the April 1918 issue of The Liberator
Anita Loos and John Emerson in Edward Steichen photo for Vanity Fair, July 1928
The 1926 cover, illustrated by Ralph Barton, for Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: The Illuminating Diary of a Professional Lady.
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (novel)
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: The Intimate Diary of a Professional Lady (1925) is a comic novel written by American author Anita Loos. The story follows the dalliances of a young blonde gold-digger and flapper named Lorelei Lee "in the bathtub-gin era of American history." Published the same year as F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and Carl Van Vechten's Firecrackers, the lighthearted work is one of several famous 1925 American novels which focus upon the carefree hedonism of the Jazz Age.
Cover of the 1926 edition
Lorelei Lee and Dorothy Shaw arrive in 1920s Paris where Lorelei spots a Coty's sign.
Lorelei and Dorothy are confronted by Lady Beekman who demands the return of her tiara.
Illustration by Ralph Barton.
