Peggy Cummins

Augusta Margaret Diane Fuller –her real name– was born on December 18, 1925 circumstantially in Denbighshire, Wales, where her Irish parents were visiting, but a storm prevented them from returning to Dublin. In this last city she lived most of her childhood until her family moved to London. Her mother, Margaret Cummins, had worked as an actress without much success.

When she was 15 years old, actor Peter Brock realized her potential when he discovered her at a tram stop. He managed to recruit her for her company, Gate Theatre, with which the young woman made her debut as the protagonist of the magazine “Let’s Pretend”, in the British capital. Shortly after her, filmmaker Herbert Mason signed her to  Dr. O’Dowd , which marked her film debut.

The prestigious producer Darryl F. Zanuck, director of 20th Century Fox, offered her a contract to travel to Hollywood. She was first cast as the lead in  Forever Amber , but her director, Kathleen Winsor, thought she was too young, so she decided to replace her. She ended up taking part in two films directed by  Joseph L. Mankiewicz ,  Escape , where she was the protagonist, a girl who helps an escaped prisoner, and  The World of George Apley , where she had a very minor role. She later led the cast of  The Green Pastures of Wyoming , sequel to  My Friend Flicka , on a white horse.

But it will remain forever in the cinephile retina for  The Demon of Guns , a low-budget film directed by  Joseph H. Lewis , secretly co-written by  Dalton Trumbo , who was part of the Hollywood blacklist. She played the prototype of Hollywood’s ‘femme fatale’, Annie Laurie, cute-looking, but relentless when it came to robbing banks with Bart, a manipulative guy obsessed with guns. Initially shaken by critics, it is now considered one of the great noir titles of the 1950s. Its style, close to documentary, influenced the careers of filmmakers such as  Jean-Luc Godard  and  François Truffaut .

However, it was his last job in the United States, where he had an extensive social life. She briefly dated John F. Kennedy himself, then an aspiring politician, and even had a dinner date with tycoon  Howard Hughes , who nevertheless had to cancel the meeting after an accident with his plane. Back in England, she married William Herbert Derek Dunnett, with whom she had two children. She remained by her side until his death in 2000.

More interested in family life, after becoming a mother she barely returned to acting. She appeared in the British film  The Night of the Devil , by  Jacques Tourneur , where she played the granddaughter of a psychologist investigating a satanic cult. Peggy Cummins  retired from filmmaking after the 1962 light comedy  In the Doghouse .