105-year-old Julie is world’s oldest living celebrity

AT the age of 105, you can safely say that nobody knows more about the history of showbiz than Julie Gibson.

The oldest of the Golden Era stars, the American is the last surviving actress to have appeared with The Three Stooges, having first come to prominence over 80 years ago.

Julie came into the world on September 6 1913, but with two versions of her early years out there, nobody is quite sure whether that was in Lewiston, Idaho, or Grant County, Washington.

What we definitely know is that she became a singer and actress with a prolific film career in the 40s.

Daughter of Mr and Mrs Grover C Sorey, she was born Gladys Camille Sorey, but her career wasn’t very old when she took her stage name of Julie Gibson.

It was as a singer with the Jimmy Grier Orchestra that Julie first gained attention, and she soon made appearances on US radio, too, to mass audiences.

Known as the Musician Host of the Coast, Grier became Julie’s first husband – she’d marry three times – and his big band orchestra were a huge hit in California and further afield. His versions of songs like Music In The Moonlight, Bon Voyage and Ship Of Dreams were never off the radio, and Jimmy also wrote film scores, so was certainly a great man to be working with.

Julie was only his wife for just over a year, from 1939 to 1940, however, and she would be single for the next 24 years, giving all her energy to her career and never having kids.

Her first major film role was in 1944 Western Lucky Cowboy, alongside Eddie Dew, who’d become better-known as a film and TV director.

Julie had already popped up in such lesser-known movies as Nice Girl and The Feminine Touch – the second of which saw Don Ameche and Rosalind Russell take the main parts, but Julie did get to sing I’m Jealous, gaining priceless exposure.

After Lucky Cowboy, the roles and script offers fairly flowed in.

Chick Carter, Detective saw her play a singer at the Century Club who reports the theft of Blue Diamond, a famed piece belonging to the club’s owner.

Detective Chick Carter is at first unaware that the owner himself had arranged the theft, in order to pay off a troublesome debt. Julie’s character had double-crossed her boss, throwing the real diamond to his hired thief. A mix-up, alas, sees the real one disappear, and Carter finds himself up against criminals on all sides.

There were similar shenanigans, based around gold, in 1947’s Bowery Buckaroos, with cowboys, Indians, gold-diggers, and a murder at Hangman’s Hollow.

All this, and it’s a comedy!

Her next biggie was another comedy, a musical one called Are You With It?.

This time, the folks being ripped off are insurance firms. When an actuary almost estimates a sum with his decimal point in the wrong place, he realises it would have cost the company a fortune, and this sends him into a deep depression. Convinced that he should get away from all this boring money-counting stuff, he is persuaded to join Acres Of Fun, a travelling carnival.

As you can see, Julie Gibson seems to have preferred plenty of variety, humour and downright oddball movies!

Which, of course, made her perfect to appear with The Three Stooges and their unique brand of off-the-wall comedy.

Three Smart Saps, their 1942 effort, was just one of almost 200 short films the madcap trio put out in an amazing 25-year series. Julie would also appear in Sock-a-Bye Baby, and she seemed to revel in the general anarchy of the Stooges’ work.

Three Smart Saps saw them trying to break into jail to free their father-in-law, while Sock-a-Bye Baby saw them wake during the night to the sound of a baby crying, having been left on their doorstep.

If you’re watching a repeat or letting a younger film fan discover the Stooges, this one is extra interesting because it shows how Julie’s acting talents had grown.

It is also fascinating because the USA was at war with Japan when it came out, and there are some very strong anti-Japanese sentiments expressed!

Although Julie’s roles would change in the 50s, with more supporting roles and TV work, her presence was felt even if nobody knew she was there – she dubbed singing voices of actresses whose own weren’t strong enough, and became the speaking voice when French and Italian movies were given an English-language version.

Her voice even landed her jobs coaching other actors how to speak correctly to suit their characters’ backgrounds.

Julie’s second marriage, in 1964 to actor and writer Dean Dillman Jr, would only last a few years. He went on to have three further wives, while Julie married one last time, to actor-director Charles Barton in 1973.

They would be together until his death in 1981, by which time Julie had long since retired from the world of acting and singing.

Not much is really known about Julie Gibson these days, except that she is alive and the oldest living celebrity on the planet.

And that in itself is quite a claim to fame!