Pitts, ZaSu (1894–1963), enjoyed a long career as an actress that began during the silent-screen era and lasted almost 50 years, through talking pictures, vaudeville, Broadway, radio, and television. In her early twenties she was sent to Hollywood by her widowed mother to earn a few dollars at the film studios, and by 1917 was cast in her first film, The Little Princess, opposite Mary Pickford. Her transition to the talkies was seamless. Pitts was cast in many comic roles, which made the most of her big, woeful eyes and nervous, fluttering hands.
