In New York she left the band to obtain film work and got a job as an extra before her career took off.

[5] Her best-known silent appearances were as the visiting stage star in Stage Struck (1925) with Gloria Swanson,[6] then as the vamp who plants stolen money on Harry Langdon in The Strong Man (1926), and as (Aunt Susan's) Flora Finch's niece, and later the traveling companion in The Cat and the Canary (1927).

Astor performed at Hal Roach studios with such headliners as Laurel and Hardy, Our Gang, and especially Charley Chase.

She was briefly glimpsed as the first murder victim in the Sherlock Holmes adventure The Scarlet Claw and was among the ranks of dress extras in 1956's Around the World in Eighty Days.

In her later years, Astor was a welcome guest at several gatherings of the Laurel and Hardy fan club, The Sons of the Desert, and became an honorary member of the Way Out West tent.