Cincinnati Marks the Legacy of Silent-Film Star Theda Bara With Sold-Out Mariemont Screening

Cincinnati will pay tribute to one of its earliest movie stars on Saturday, Oct. 24, when the Mariemont Theatre hosts a sold-out evening devoted to silent-film actress Theda Bara.

Bara, born in Avondale, was among the biggest names of the silent screen for about five years. She became known as the original screen "vamp," a seductive woman portrayed as dangerous to men. Studio publicists built a fictional backstory for her, billing her as an Arab princess raised in the shadow of the Sphinx and noting that her name was an anagram for "Arab Death."

The reality was far more local. In her own words, she was "a nice Jewish girl from Cincinnati." She was born Theodosia Goodman on July 29, 1885, at 823 Hutchins Ave., the daughter of a Jewish tailor and a Swiss mother. After graduating from Walnut Hills High School, she spent two years at the University of Cincinnati and then moved to New York City to pursue acting.

Between 1914 and 1919, Bara made 40 films. Her titles included The Stain, A Fool There Was, The Devil's Daughter, The Serpent, East Lynne, Romeo and Juliet, Cleopatra, The She Devil and The Siren's Song. "She's truly a fascinating Cincinnati figure," said Nadya Ellerhorst, producer of The Art Show series on public television stations WCET-TV and WPTD-TV.

Ellerhorst is also producer-director of Theda Bara's Memoirs, an eight-minute film about the actress. Saturday's program will screen that film along with A Fool There Was. A panel discussion will follow, featuring Dr. Jennifer Glaser, a University of Cincinnati associate professor and Bara historian; Brian Powers, a historian with the Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library; and Ellerhorst. With Halloween one week away, the evening also includes a Theda Bara costume contest.

Those without tickets can still watch Theda Bara's Memoirs online. After airing on Channels 48 and 16, it has drawn 50,000 views on YouTube since May 2025. The documentary includes excerpts from A Fool There Was, East Lynne, The Unchastened Woman and Cleopatra, and it details a 450-page typed, unpublished biography held in the University of Cincinnati Archives and Rare Book Library.

Much of Bara's work can no longer be seen. Only three of her films survive; the rest were lost in a 1937 fire at Fox Studios. Her film career essentially ended in 1919, before she turned 35, though she returned to the screen five years later for two films, The Unchastened Woman in 1925 and Madame Mystery in 1926.

In 1921, Bara married film director Charles Brabin. Xavier University has long said it acquired her former home, at Victory Parkway and Ledgewood Drive, from a different owner in 1979 and used it as the "Villa" for its Honors College and other purposes. The university demolished the Spanish-style house in 2011.

Bara died of abdominal cancer in Los Angeles in 1955, at age 69.