---
name: "Barbara Read"
canonical: "https://film.one/person/barbara-read"
roles: ["Actor"]
born: "29 December 1917"
died: "11 December 1963"
reviewed_on_fi1m: 1
average_as: "actor"
average_over: 1
updated: "2026-09-19T23:26:20.186107+00:00"
licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL."
---

# Barbara Read

Actor. Born 29 December 1917 in Port Arthur, Ontario, Canada. Died 11 December 1963.

## Details

- **Work:** Actor
- **Born:** 29 December 1917, Port Arthur, Ontario, Canada
- **Died:** 11 December 1963
- **Also known as:** Barbara French Read, Barbara Reed
- **Elsewhere:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Read, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q4859243, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0713799/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/140081

## Biography

Barbara Read, also credited as Barbara Reed, was a Canadian-American actress who appeared in 21 films between 1936 and 1948.

Born Barbara French Read on 29 December 1917 in Port Arthur, Ontario, she made her screen debut as Kay Craig in the 1936 Universal comedy *Three Smart Girls*, alongside Deanna Durbin and Nan Grey. She is also known for her role as Rhoda Cooper in *Make Way for Tomorrow* (1937) and for portraying Margo Lane in three films in the Shadow series in the mid-1940s.

Read was married to actor William Talman from 1953 to 1960. She died by suicide on 12 December 1963 at her home in Laguna Beach, California.

*Sources: en.wikipedia.org, imdb.com.*

## On Fi1m (1)

- *Three Smart Girls* (1936), Fi1m 72, as Kay Craig — [page](https://film.one/film/three-smart-girls.md)

## Complete filmography (22)

Every credit, newest first. Titles without a page can be requested for review on the HTML page.

- *Santabear's First Christmas* (1986), Story
- *Coroner Creek* (1948), as Abbie Miles (as Barbara Reed)
- *Key Witness* (1947), as Martha Higby (as Barbara Reed)
- *Ginger* (1947), as Peggy Sullivan (as Barbara Reed)
- *The Missing Lady* (1946), as Margo Lane
- *Death Valley* (1946), as Mitzi
- *Behind the Mask* (1946), as Margo Lane
- *The Shadow Returns* (1946), as Margo Lane
- *Rubber Racketeers* (1942), as Mary Dale
- *Too Many Women* (1942), as Linda Pearson
- *Curtain Call* (1940), as Helen Middleton
- *Married and in Love* (1940), as Helen Yates
- *The Spellbinder* (1939), as Janet Marlowe
- *Sorority House* (1939), as Dotty Spencer
- *The Crime of Doctor Hallet* (1938), as Claire Saunders
- *Midnight Intruder* (1938), as Patricia Hammond
- *Merry Go Round of 1938* (1937), as Clarice Stockbridge
- *The Man Who Cried Wolf* (1937), as Nan
- *The Road Back* (1937), as Lucy
- *Make Way for Tomorrow* (1937), as Rhoda Cooper
- *The Mighty Treve* (1937), as Aileen Fenno
- *Three Smart Girls* (1936), as Kay Craig — Fi1m 72, [page](https://film.one/film/three-smart-girls.md)

## Gallery

- ![Barbara Read](https://film.one/media/person/1229540/gallery-585b31b3952d.jpg) Barbara Read — Los Angeles Times, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/bc/Barbara_Read.jpg/1280px-Barbara_Read.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail)
- ![Barbara Read](https://film.one/media/person/1229540/gallery-10f1f5ef1f0b.jpg) Barbara Read — Image via TMDB

---
© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/person/barbara-read