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This article is about Ann Pennington, the stage actress. For the Playboy model of the same name, go to Ann Pennington (model).

Ann Pennington
Ann Pennington in her Ziegfeld days.[1]
Birthname	Anna Pennington
Birth	December 23, 1893(1893-12-23) Wilmington, Delaware
Death	November 4, 1971 (aged 77) New York City
Height	4'10"
Nicknames	"Penny", "Tiny"
Spouse	None

Ann Pennington (December 23, 1893–November 4, 1971) was an actress, dancer, and singer who starred on Broadway in the 1910s and 1920s, notably in the Ziegfeld Follies and George White's Scandals.

She became famous for what was, at the time, called a “Shake and Quiver Dancer,” and was noted for her variation of the “Black Bottom”. She was also noted as an accomplished tap dancer.

Pennington also achieved fame as a star of both silent and sound motion pictures.

Contents 1 Biography 2 Review 3 Stage Credits 4 Motion Picture Credits 4.1 Silent Films 4.2 Sound Films 5 External links

Anna Pennington was born in Wilmington, Delaware on December 23, 1893 and reputedly moved with her family to Camden, New Jersey around 1900 .

She began her career on Broadway as a member of the chorus in The Red Widow (1911) starring Raymond Hitchcock. Her debut in the Ziegfeld Follies was in 1913, where she quickly established herself as one Ziegfeld's top attractions.

With dimpled knees and long dark hair, the petite, pretty, charming, and often scantly-clad Pennington stood a mere 4' 10" tall and wore only a size 1½ shoe. Because of her diminutive stature, she was referred to as “Penny” by her friends and colleagues. Her nickname for herself was “Tiny”.

During her years in the Ziegfeld Follies she appeared alongside the likes of Bert Williams, Eddie Cantor, Will Rogers, Fanny Brice (who became her closest friend), Marilyn Miller, and W.C. Fields.

The New York Times (November 5, 1971) noted:

She liked practical jokes. Once, when a man she didn't particularly like, telephoned, asking, "Is this Miss Pennington?" she replied, "This ain't me." Her dressing room door bore a sign, "For Men Only."

Pennington was romantically linked to several men during her lifetime, and at one time or another was engaged to boxer Jack Dempsey, theatrical producer George White, actor Buster West, and musician Brooke Johns. None of these romances lasted and Pennington never married.

After her years on stage and screen ended, Pennington toured in vaudeville. She retired from performing in the 1940s.

Ann Pennington died in New York City on November 4, 1971, aged 77.

Of Ann Pennington’s official film debut in Susie Snowflake, the New York Times stated on June 26, 1916:

Many of those who went to the Broadway yesterday for the first showing of Susie Snowflake will be inclined to endorse this particular nomination. Miss Pennington is obviously put forth as a diminutive star of the Marguerite Clark variety, a style enormously in vogue at the moment. She is little and cunning on Mr. Ziegfeld’s stage and little and cunning on the screen. She has youth, a Mary Pickford like harum-scarum way with her and, except in the trying close-ups when her expression is somewhat adenoidal, she is pretty.

Of course she dances. As her frisky little dance is her sole claim to fame at the moment, it could no more be omitted from her first scenario than the “pump and washing tubs” in Mr. Crummles’s theater. So as a child of the music halls adapted into a staid, old New England community, Susie Snowflake disrupts a church sociable by doing her Follies dance there in her terse Follies costume.

The following list contains all of Ann Pennington's known motion picture appearances.

• Ann Pennington (Ziegfeld star) at the Internet Movie Database
• Ann Pennington at the Internet Broadway Database
• Silent Ladies and Gents features pictures of Ann Pennington