After being orphaned when she was 4 years old, Maris lived with her grandmother in France and was educated in a convent in France,[REF][REF] in England, and in Germany and by the age of 19 she spoke four languages - French, German, English and Spanish [REF].
In the April 1930 issue of Picture Play magazine, William H. McKegg wrote that Maris "has assimilated much from each country [in which she has lived] - cynical frankness of the French, the simplicity of the Germans -- the romanticism of the Italians, and the independence of the English."[REF] .