Linda Arvidson

Linda Arvidson (born Linda Arvidson Johnson, July 12, 1884 – July 26, 1949; sometimes credited as Linda Griffith) was an American stage and film actress. She became one of America's early motion picture stars while working at Biograph Studios in New York, where none of the company's actors, until 1913, were credited on screen. Along with Florence Lawrence, Marion Leonard, and other female performers there, she was often referred to by theatergoers and in trade publications as simply one of the "Biograph girls". Arvidson began working in the new, rapidly expanding film industry after meeting her future husband D. W. Griffith, who impressed her as an innovative screen director. Their marriage was kept secret for reasons of professional discretion.

Biography

The daughter of Swedish parents, Arvidson was the first wife of film director D. W. Griffith. She played lead roles in many of his early films.

In 1925, she wrote her autobiography When the Movies Were Young. She is mentioned in William J. Mann's The Biograph Girl, a novel based on Florence Lawrence.

On July 26, 1949, Arvidson died in New York City at age 65.

Career

Arvidson's first professional role was on stage at the Alcazar Theatre in San Francisco in a 1904 adaptation of The Christian by British novelist Hall Caine. In this production, she portrayed one of the fisher girls and earned a weekly wage of three dollars and 40 cents for her performances. One experience called up after another as Arvidson performed in a variety of recitals across San Francisco's great concert halls. She appeared as a servant boy in the play Fedora. It was on this production where she met David Wark Griffith, a supporting actor and her future husband, who at that time worked under the stage name Lawrence Griffith. Through the next few months in which Arvidson and Griffith were together, Arvidson spent time performing small roles in productions at the Burbank Theatre in Los Angeles and at the Orpheum.