92. In "Penny Serenade", Irene Dunne and Cary Grant play a couple who lose a child, then adopt a baby girl who later dies of influenza. What about this film was very personal for Dunne?
From Quiz First Lady of the 30s: Irene Dunne
Answer:
Her only child was an adopted child.
Cary Grant was married five times, but never to Irene Dunne. She was married only once, to a dentist who was far-removed from the Hollywood life. Her marriage lasted from 1928 until his death in 1965.
Her daughter, Mary Frances, called Missy, was never in the limelight, like many Hollywood children. Dunne adopted her outside of California because she "dreaded the reporters and cameramen who would wait for us outside the Judge's chambers." As a teenager, Missy went to a girls' boarding school outside Hollywood, with a reputation for strong academics, and stronger values. Mary Frances Griffin has written short, fond reminiscences of her mother, and no tell-all books along the lines of "Mommy Dearest".
Although Dunne was a private person, who never shared the reason for choosing to adopt, she is not known to have ever been pregnant, and she never lost a living child.