Frances Dee

Frances Marion Dee (November 26, 1909 – March 6, 2004) was an American actress. Her first film was the musical Playboy of Paris. She starred in films An American Tragedy (1931), Little Women (1933) and Becky Sharp (1935). She is perhaps also known for starring in the 1943 Val Lewton psychological horror film I Walked With a Zombie.

Early life The younger daughter of Francis "Frank" Marion Dee and his wife, the former Henriette Putnam, Frances Marion Dee was born in Los Angeles, California, where her father worked as a civil service examiner.

When Dee was seven years old, her family moved to Chicago, Illinois. The couple married on October 20, 1933, after a whirlwind courtship, and remained married until McCrea's death in 1990. During their lifetime together, the McCreas lived, raised their children, and rode their horses on their ranch in what was then an unincorporated area of eastern Ventura County, California. They ultimately donated several hundred acres of their personal property to the newly formed Conejo Valley YMCA for the city of Thousand Oaks, California. Dee, like McCrea, was a Republican. Joel McCrea died on their 57th wedding anniversary.

Dee was honored at the 1998 Memphis Film Festival in Tennessee. In 2004, Frances Dee McCrea died in Norwalk, Connecticut due to complications from a stroke at the age of 94. Filmography