The actress, born Bettyjane Greer, had actually been in LIFE magazine twice before that ’47 cover. In 1942 she appeared, unnamed, as one of three women modeling the uniforms of the W.A.A.C.s, the new all-female military unit that came into being during World War II. She got the modeling job because her mother worked in the War Department. The very businesslike picture, included in this story, is not the sort of photograph that you would necessarily expect to draw attention to a young woman—but it hit the radar of singer Rudy Vallee. According to the magazine, Vallee “tried unsuccessfully to worm Miss Greer’s address out of LIFE.” He did connect with Greer eventually when she came to Hollywood, resulting in a brief marriage between the two. She and Vallee separated after three months. The uniform modeling job, which also made it to newsreels, had led to a screen test with David O. Selznick, reported LIFE. But “Miss Greer signed up elsewhere, however—with Howard Hughes.”

In its 1947 story LIFE described her audition for Hughes:

She prepared for her first interview with Mr. Hughes by carefully learning the script with which she had heard he tested all aspiring stars. It was a comedy, The Awful Truth, and, because Howard Hughes is a little deaf, Miss Greer read it at the top of her lungs.

Hughes was charmed. And this is when the noir aspects of Greer’s story really took hold. Greer not only signed with Hughes but for time was in a relationship with the eccentric billionaire. She eventually bought her way out of Hughes’ contract and caught on with RKO. LIFE wrote about Greer again for a story about starlets in training, and that studio soon gave Greer the female lead in Out of the Past. By that time she was also married to attorney Edward Lasker, and seemingly set up for superstardom.

But then who should come out of Greer’s past but Howard Hughes, now feeling jealous toward Greer. He bought RKO, which meant that Hughes now controlled her contract. “He said to me, while you are under contract to me, you will never work,” Greer recounted in an interview decades later. “And I said, `But that will be the end of my career.’ And he said, “I guess it will, won’t it?”

Hughes didn’t completely end her career, but he put a damper on it at a time she should have been reaching new heights. Eventually Greer got herself out of her RKO contract and returned to regular work, including multiple appearances in the 1950s on The Ford Television Theatre. And she enjoyed a late-career revival in the 1980s, including an appearance in Against All Odds, the 1984 remake of Out of the Past that starred Jeff Bridges and featured Greer as the mother of the movie’s female lead, played by Rachel Ward. Greer also had a six-episode run on the prime-time soap opera Falcon Crest, and appeared in three episodes of the David Lynch television show Twin Peaks.

She died in 2001 of complications from cancer, just shy of her 77th birthday.

Jane Greer modeled the uniforms for the new WAAC units in LIFE, 1942.

Charles Steinheimer/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

This montage was the opening photo of a LIFE story on actress Jane Greer in a 1947 issue of LIFE; the caption said that she was “dreaming that she is pursued by the men she has been bumping off all day on the movie set.”

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Actress Jane Greer, 1947.

Peter Stackpole/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Actress Jane Greer, 1947.

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Actress Jane Greer (C) performing in scene from the 1947 movie Out of the Past with actors Steve Brodie (left) and Robert Mitchum.

Peter Stackpole/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Actress Jane Greer, 1947.

Peter Stackpole/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Actress Jane Greer, 1947.

Peter Stackpole/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Actress Jane Greer acting like drunken type, 1947.

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Jane Greer on set of The Company She Keeps, 1950.

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Jane Greer (left), with Jeff Bridges and Swoosie Kurtz, costars in the 1984 film Against All Odds, which was a remake of Greer’s 1947 classic Out of the Past.

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The post Jane Greer: The Actress Whose Career Howard Hughes Tried to Quash appeared first on LIFE.

Here’s how LIFE described the world of these young women, which is something other than a dream:

The nine girls on this page are all movie starlets whom the RKO Studio is paying and training in the hope that it may find one of them to be a new and different version of Katherine Hepburn or Ginger Rogers. Each girl is on a seven-year contract starting at $100 a week, but the studio may terminate the contract every six months.

A starlet leads a life of work and worry—the dedicated and ordered sort of existence enforced on officer candidates in the Army. Usually she knows little about acting and therefore must be instructed. Grooming and posture must be improved. Diction must be changed to remove all trace of local accent.

All the while she worries about getting her contract renewed and about getting publicity. Even more than by schooling she helps herself by getting her picture in newspapers when she is chosen “Miss Poppyseed Roll” by the baker’s association or “The Girl We Would Most Like to Tie Up To” by the docker’s union. Finally comes a real screen test and, in most cases, the ax.

Among the nine starlets who where photographed by LIFE’s Bob Landry, two can be said to have made their mark on the cinema. One was Martha Hyer, who was nominated for an Academy Award for supporting actress for the 1958 drama Some Came Running, which was directed by Vincent Minelli and also starred Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Shirley MacLaine.

Then there’s Jane Greer, who came to RKO as the ex-wife of singer Rudy Vallee (they married when she was 19 and divorced eight months later), and had actually been in LIFE before, in 1942, when she modeled a WAAC uniform. Greer went on to earn a leading role in the 1947 noir classic Out of The Past opposite Robert Mitchum, but then her career went on standstill for a while after RKO was bought by billionaire Howard Hughes, her former lover. (For more on Greer and that drama, see this story). Greer eventually moved on from RKO, and her career had a late second wind that included appearing in Against All Odds, the 1984 remake of Out of the Past, and also three episodes of the David Lynch TV show Twin Peaks.

The results for the other starlets were mixed at best. Nan Lesilie worked plenty, with 82 IMDB credits from movies and television. Virginia Huston who was heavily featured in the LIFE pics, appeared in Out of the Past with Greer, and wound up with about a dozen credits in her film career. Nancy Saunders had a lead role in the 1947 crime drama The Millerson Case, and after a dormant period she collected some relatively recent credits, including appearing as a landlady in an episode of Dawson’s Creek.

Vonne Lester had 11 roles but only one credited, when she played a messenger girl in the TV version of The Thin Man. Debra Alden had one credit, 1947’s Code of the West. Of Mimi Berry’s four roles, three were uncredited. Bonnie Blair‘s career had a similar fate.

As the LIFE’s story made clear, success for such starlets was more the exception than the rule. The process in Hollywood has changed a great deal since 1946, but one constant remains: it’s tough to make it as an actress.

RKO Studio starlets Nancy Saunders, Debra Alden, Virginia Huston (top row, left to righ)t; Martha Hyer, Mimi Berry, and Bonnie Blair (middle row, left to right); and Vonne Lester, Jane Greer and Nan Leslie (bottom row), 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Actor Robert Clark (foreground left) and starlet-in-training Virginia Huston (right, foreground) take lessons from a drama coach with other students in the background, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

RKO starlets trained with studio dance director Charlie O’Curran, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

RKO starlets trained with studio dance director Charlie O’Curran, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hollywood starlets being trained by RKO Studio, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

RKO starlets in training, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hopeful RKO Studio starlet Virginia Huston posed in front of a measurements board, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hopeful RKO starlet Virginia Hoston posing in front of a measurements board, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Virginia Huston, RKO starlet, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hopeful RKO Studio starlet Virginia Huston was dressed in an evening gown, 1946.

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Virginia Huston, RKO starlet, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

RKO starlets-in-training tanned on the studio roof during their lunch hour, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

RKO starlets-in-training tanned on the studio roof during their lunch hour, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

RKO starlets-in-training tanned on the studio roof during their lunch hour, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A collection of starlets being trained at RKO Studio, 1946.

Bob Landry/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post What Became of This Rookie Class of RKO Starlets? appeared first on LIFE.