Edwina Booth
Toronto Daily Star, June 8 1935
Edwina Booth (1904-1991) sued MGM for over a million dollars, claiming that she had been provided with inadequate protection and clothing during the filming of Trader Horn. (During filming, she caught malaria, suffered from sunstroke, fell out of a tree, was cut by elephant grass, and may have caught schistosomiasis.) She reportedly settled for $35,000, which was a large sum of money in those days (and isn't that small of a sum these days). The "super-white goddess" references in the article are because she played "Nina Trent, the White Goddess" in that movie.
Unfortunately for her, no major studio would employ her after this. She appeared in some low-budget movies in 1931 and 1932 (the last of which was Trapped in Tia Juana). It took her six years after that to completely recover from her time in Africa.
Following her recovery, she stopped appearing in public. She became involved in the Mormon church, devoted herself to good works, was married and widowed twice, and tried never to mention that she was once a movie star. Rumours of her death appeared several times before she actually passed away in 1991. A Utah history site has a more detailed biography of her.
As for Trader Horn: it was a success when it was finally released in 1931, earning an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture. YouTube has a trailer for the movie; I couldn't watch all of it, as there was too much footage of animals being killed or injured, not to mention all of the crude cultural stereotypes.
Created September 1, 2025.