Mae Clarke (born Violet Mary Klotz; August 16, 1910 – April 29, 1992) was an American actress. She is widely remembered for playing Henry Frankenstein's bride Elizabeth, who is chased by Boris Karloff in Frankenstein, and for being on the receiving end of James Cagney's halved grapefruit in The Public Enemy. Both films were released in 1931. Early life Mae Clarke was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Her father was a theater organist. She studied dancing as a child and began on stage in vaudeville and also worked in night clubs. Career Clarke started her professional career as a dancer in New York City, sharing a room with Barbara Stanwyck. She subsequently starred in many films for Universal Studios, including the original screen version of The Front Page (1931) and the first sound version of Frankenstein (1931), with Boris Karloff. Clarke played the role of Henry Frankenstein's fiancée, Elizabeth, who is attacked by the Monster (Karloff) on her wedding day. The Public Enemy, released that same year, contained one of cinema's most famous (and frequently parodied) scenes, in which James Cagney pushes a half grapefruit into Clarke's face, then goes out to pick up Jean Harlow. The film was so popular that it ran 24 hours a day at a theater in Times Square upon its initial release; scarcely 4 months after the premiere, The Hollywood Reporter informed readers that Clarke's ex-husband Lew Brice claimed to have seen the film more than 20 times (and at least twice a week), and that Brice "says he goes to see the scene wherein Mae Clarke gets hit in the eye with a grapefruit—and that it's a plazure!" Clarke appeared as Myra Deauville in the 1931 pre-Code version of Waterloo Bridge. In the film she portrays a young American woman who is forced by circumstance into a life of prostitution in World War I London; both the film and Clarke's performance were well received by the critics. Clarke also appeared in the modest pre-Code Universal film Night World (1932), with Lew Ayres, Boris Karloff, Hedda Hopper, and George Raft. In 1933 she was the female lead in Fast Workers, John Gilbert's last film as a contracted MGM star, and Lady Killer with James Cagney and Margaret Lindsay. That same year, she and actor Phillips Holmes were in a single-car accident that left Clarke with a broken jaw and facial scarring. Those injuries, however, did