Dorothy Tuttle (born Dorothy Polk Tuttle; April 21, 1918 – August 12, 1998) was an American dancer and performer, primarily working at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) in film musicals of the 1940s.
Early Life
Born in Los Angeles to Walter and Estrella Tuttle, she was trained in ballet from a young age. To help supplement the household income, she sought work as a dancer. Urged by a friend to audition for MGM studios in 1937, she was hired for the film Rosalie as a background dancer. Since she was still a teenager, she attended the studio high school.
Career
Tuttle appeared as a dancer and background performer in dozens of MGM films, including Marie Antoinette (1938), Ziegfeld Girl (1941), Born to Sing (1942), Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), The Harvey Girls (1946), and Summer Stock (1950). She was one of the few members of the "MGM chorus" who held a studio contract. Her ballet skills were also utilized on the set of various Esther Williams films, where she taught swimmers ballet dance movements.
Notable on-screen moments include playing a waitress in the Judy Garland musical The Harvey Girls; a trolley passenger whom Judy Garland sings to in "The Trolley Song" in Meet Me in St. Louis; and as Gene Kelly's dance partner for the song "Niña" in The Pirate (1948), in which Kelly grabs a lit cigarette from her lips, places it in his mouth, turns it inward, and then kisses Tuttle with the lit cigarette still inside his mouth.
Nicknamed "Tut" while at MGM, she was often seen alongside fellow dancer Dorothy Gilmore Raye in the musicals of the Arthur Freed Unit. They remained lifelong friends and later appeared together in two documentaries: Judy Garland: Beyond the Rainbow (1997) and MGM: When the Lion Roars (1992).
She also worked for other studios: 20th Century Fox (Tin Pan Alley, 1940; Call Me Mister, 1951); Warner Bros. (Tea for Two, 1950; Lullaby of Broadway, 1951); and Columbia Pictures, where she danced with Marilyn Monroe in Ladies of the Chorus (1948).
Her final screen appearances were in An American in Paris (1951) as a ballet dancer and Love Is Better than Ever (1952), during which she was in the early stages of pregnancy with her first son. She retired from film that same year to raise a family.
Later Life and Death
Tuttle married Gene La Tour in 1950 and had three sons. She divorced La Tour in the early 1980s and married James Nitch in 1984. She became active in Santa Monica civic groups working to preserve historic sites, the Santa Monica Republican Women's Club, and the Santa Monica Presbyterian Church, where she served as volunteer wedding director. She was also active with The International Wizard of Oz Club in the 1980s and 1990s.
Tuttle died in Encino, Los Angeles, on August 12, 1998, at the age of 80.
