Claudette Colbert

Émilie "Lily" Chauchoin was born in 1903 in Saint-Mandé, France, to Jeanne (née Loew with British Channel Islands heritage) and Georges Chauchoin. Although christened "Émilie", she was called "Lily" after Jersey-born actress Lillie Langtry, and because an unmarried aunt of the same name—her maternal grandmother's adopted child, Emily Loew—was living with the family. Colbert's brother, Charles Chauchoin, was also born in the Bailiwick of Jersey. Jeanne held various occupations, while Georges owned pastry and bonbon shops, and was also a major stockholder of an ink factory in which he suffered business setbacks. Colbert's grandmother Marie Loew had been to the U.S., and Georges' brother-in-law Charles Loew was living in New York City. Marie was willing to help Georges financially, but also encouraged him to try his luck in the U.S. To pursue more employment opportunities, Colbert and her family, including Marie and Emily Loew, emigrated to Manhattan in 1906. They lived in a fifth-floor walk-up at 53rd Street. Colbert stated that she was always climbing those stairs until the age of 18. Her parents formally changed her legal name to Lily Claudette Chauchoin. Georges worked as a minor official in the foreign department at First National City Bank, and the family was naturalized in 1912. Before Colbert entered public school, she quickly learnt British English from Marie, and grew up bilingual, speaking both English and French. She had hoped to become a painter ever since she first gripped a pencil. Her brother was drafted 1917 as private first class. After the First World War, he studied at the School of Military Aeronautics at Cornell University. Colbert's mother was an opera music fan, and her aunt was a dressmaker. Colbert studied at Washington Irving High School, which was known for its strong arts program. Her speech teacher, Alice Rostetter, encouraged her to audition for a play Rostetter had written. In 1921, Colbert made her stage debut at the Provincetown Playhouse in revivals of Rostetter's The Widow's Veil and Aria da Capo by Edna St. Vincent Millay, at the age of 17. Her interests, though, still leaned towards painting, fashion design, and commercial art. Intending to become a fashion designer, she attended the Art Students League of New York, where she paid for her art education by working in a dress shop. After attending a party with writer Anne Morrison, Colbert was offered a bit part in Morrison's play, and appeared on the Broadway stage in a small role in The Wild Westcotts (1923). She had used the name Claudette, instead of Lily, since high school; for her stage name, she added her paternal grandmother's maiden name, Colbert. Her father died in 1925, her grandmother died in New York in mid-1930s at age 88.