Beecher, Janet

(1884-1955)

   Born Janet Meysenburg in Jefferson City, Missouri, Janet Beecher was raised in Chicago and studied there and in New York before her first stage appearance in a bit role in 1903. In 1904, she scored a hit in The Education of Mr. Pipp, and the show ran for two years. She subsequently appeared in numerous plays, including The Lottery Man (1909), The Concert (1910), Fair and Warmer (1915), A Bill of Divorcement (1921), and Courage (1928), but her greatest successes were in comedies. After 1930, Beecher played character roles in motion pictures, but returned to the stage for John P. Marquand and George S. Kaufman's The Late George Apley* (1944).