Priscilla Bonner; ‘20s Star of Silent Film

Priscilla Bonner, leading lady opposite such stars as Will Rogers in more than two dozen silent films of the 1920s, has died. She was 97.

Bonner died Wednesday night at Queen of Angels Hospital, said her friend and executor, William G. Barbour.

A native of Washington, D.C., the youthful beauty was a strong believer in telepathy and other parapsychological phenomena. It was such an experience--she sometimes labeled it intuition--that propelled her to Hollywood to become an actress in 1920.

With no pause for bit parts, she started at the top, as leading lady to Charles Ray in “Homer Comes Home,” and opposite the American raconteur Rogers in “Honest Hutch.” She also starred with Harry Langdon in “The Strong Man” and appeared with Clara Bow in the classic “It.”

Her other films, frequently presented at Los Angeles’ Silent Movie Theater, included “Charley’s Aunt,” “Long Pants,” “The Red Kimono” and “The Son of Wallingford.”

Bonner retired from acting in 1928 when she married Beverly Hills physician Bertham Wollfan, who died in 1962. The couple were popular hosts to Los Angeles’ burgeoning literary and film community and particularly befriended Preston Sturges, the writer and director.

She appeared in 1990 on the PBS program surveying his work, “Preston Sturges: The Rise and Fall of an American Dreamer.”

Bonner’s sister, Marjorie, a silent film actress who died in 1988, was married to Malcolm Lowry, author of “Under the Volcano,” which was made into a film in 1984 starring Albert Finney.

Barbour said that Bonner, who believed in the survival of human personality after physical death, had asked that any memorial donations be sent to Dr. Ian Stevenson, University of Virginia Division of Personal Studies, Box 152, Health Sciences Center, Charlottesville, Va. 22908.