The truth was that her father was an English railway engineer from Darlington called Arthur Thompson, and not in the army. She said that her father had been an army officer who had died in a hunting accident. The facts regarding her birth and family were deliberately falsified and obscured by the actress early in her career in order to conceal both her racial origins and the bizarre mystery surrounding her birth.įrom her first arrival in Hollywood, Merle's version of her origins claimed that she was born in Tasmania and christened Estelle Merle O’Brien Thompson. She was born Estelle Merle O'Brien Thompson, on 19 February, 1911 in Bombay, India. She was of Eurasian heritage and she spent her whole working life trying to conceal the fact. She was hauntingly beautiful and appeared in numerous high quality productions including, 'The Scarlet Pimpernel' in 1934, 'The Dark Angel' in 1935 for which she was nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award, and 'Wuthering Heights' with Laurence Olivier in 1939. Merle Oberon was one of Hollywood's top actresses during the 1930s and 1940s.
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