The Sudden Death of Hollywood’s Blonde Bombshell. Jean Harlow, 1937

She was the first platinum blonde, and the biggest star at the biggest studio in Hollywood. Then, two months after her wedding, her husband was found dead at his house in Benedict Canyon, and the studio's men got there two hours before the police did. Five years later, at twenty six, she was dead too, of a kidney disease that today she would almost certainly have survived. This is the story of Jean Harlow from the record, not the legend: Harlean Carpenter of Kansas City, the elopement at sixteen, Howard Hughes and Hell's Angels, the platinum craze, MGM and Paul Bern, the night on Easton Drive, the note, the other wife nobody had been told about, the films that made her the biggest earner at the studio, and the illness nobody caught in time. In this documentary: • Harlean Carpenter, Kansas City, and Mama Jean • Eloped at sixteen with Charles McGrew • Extra work, Hal Roach and Double Whoopee with Laurel and Hardy • Howard Hughes, Hell's Angels and the premiere at Grauman's Chinese Theatre • Platinum Blonde, and the bleach craze that followed • The Public Enemy, Red-Headed Woman and Red Dust with Clark Gable • Paul Bern: the wedding, the house on Easton Drive, and Labor Day 1932 • MGM's men at the house before the police, the inquest, and the note • Dorothy Millette, the Delta King, and the questions that were never answered • Dinner at Eight, Bombshell, China Seas and Libeled Lady • William Powell, and a novel put away in a drawer • Saratoga, the misdiagnosis, and whether she could have been saved • Forest Lawn, and the film they finished with a double Chapters: 0:00 The Blonde Bombshell 0:48 Part One · Harlean 2:42 A Small Request 2:54 Part Two · Platinum 5:25 Part Three · The Studio 7:49 Part Four · Labor Day 11:15 Part Five · The Other Wife 13:45 Part Six · The Show Goes On 16:52 Part Seven · Saratoga 21:25 Part Eight · The Record Hollywood Retrospective tells the true stories behind old Hollywood's scandals, legends and forgotten lives, taken from the record and not the gossip. Subscribe for more true stories from old Hollywood. #JeanHarlow #OldHollywood #HollywoodHistory