Marie Dressler - Legacy

Legacy

Dressler's birth home in Cobourg, Ontario is known as "Marie Dressler House" and is open to the public. The home was converted to a restaurant in 1937 and operated as a restaurant until 1989, when it was damaged by fire. It was restored but did not open again as a restaurant. It was the office of the Cobourg Chamber of Commerce until its conversion to its current use as a museum about Dressler and as a visitor information office for Cobourg. Each year, the Marie Dressler Foundation Vintage Film Festival is held, with screenings in Cobourg and in Port Hope, Ontario.

For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Marie Dressler has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1731 Vine Street, added in 1960.

In the late 1990s, two biographies of Dressler were published. One was entitled: Marie Dressler: The Unlikeliest Star, by Ontario resident Betty Lee. The other, by Matthew Kennedy, titled Marie Dressler: A Biography (1999), is the more comprehensive source; however, only Lee had access to the diary of an intimate friend of Dressler's, the silent film actress Claire Dubrey. "A Great Big Girl Like Me: The Films of Marie Dressler" by Victoria Sturtevant was published in 2009.

Canada Post, as part of its "Canada in Hollywood" series, issued a postage stamp on June 30, 2008 to honour Marie Dressler.