Born 1917 as Betty Graftina Leabo in Excelsior Springs, Missouri, American actress Brenda Joyce appeared in many B-movies of the 1940s, and had a prominent supporting role in the major film The Rains Came (1939) opposite George Brent and Myrna Loy, and was cast as Maris Hanover in the film, Little Tokyo, U.S.A. (1942).
Joyce is best-remembered as the seventh actress to play Jane in the Tarzan series of films. She succeeded Maureen O’Sullivan in the series and appeared in the role five times.
Her first four appearances as Jane were opposite Johnny Weissmuller. However, her last performance as Jane, in Tarzan’s Magic Fountain (1949), was with Lex Barker as Tarzan. Joyce and Karla Schramm, from the silent era, were the only two actresses to play Jane opposite two different actors playing Tarzan.
Joyce retired “at the peak of her career to raise a family.” She died of pneumonia at age 92 in 2009, in a nursing home in Santa Monica, California. Take a look at these fabulous photos to see the beauty of young Brenda Joyce in the 1940s.
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