Susan Peters (born Suzanne Carnahan; July 3, 1921 – October 23, 1952) was an American actress who appeared in more than twenty films over the course of her decade-long career.

Upon graduating from Hollywood High School, she studied acting with Austrian theater director Max Reinhardt, and signed a contract with Warner Bros. Pictures.

The same year, she had a featured role in the Mervyn LeRoy-directed drama Random Harvest, which earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress and established her as a serious dramatic performer.

[3][4] In 1928, her father was killed in a car accident in Portland,[2] after which the family relocated to Seattle, Washington,[a] and later to Los Angeles to live with Peters' maternal French-born grandmother, Maria Patteneaude, a dermatologist.

[7] During her years in high school, she worked after hours in a Los Angeles department store, earning money to help support her mother and brother.

[9] While performing in a showcase production of Philip Barry's Holiday at the Reinhardt School,[9] Peters was spotted by a talent scout for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), who gave her a walk-on part in George Cukor's Susan and God (1940).

[11] Despite her apprehension on set, Peters became a protégée of Cukor, who personally assigned her to private acting lessons with drama coach Gertrude Vogler.

[14] She had her first credited role in the big-budget Western film Santa Fe Trail (1940), opposite Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland.

"[9] After Santa Fe Trail, Peters had small roles in The Strawberry Blonde, Meet John Doe, Here Comes Happiness (1941), and Scattergood Pulls the Strings (all 1941), the latter of which earned her favorable reviews.

[15] She then had a lead role as an ingénue in the comedy Three Sons o' Guns (1941), followed by a dramatic part playing the girlfriend of a convict in The Big Shot (1942), opposite Richard Travis and Humphrey Bogart.

[18] Several months after being dropped by Warner Bros., Peters was contacted by MGM to test for a supporting role in the film Tish (1942), a loose adaptation of a series of stories by Mary Roberts Rinehart.

[22] After completing Andy Hardy's Double Life (1942) in which she appeared with Mickey Rooney in the very short final scene, [23] Mervyn LeRoy cast Peters in the drama Random Harvest (also 1942),[24] in which she portrayed a young woman who falls in love with her step-uncle.

[1][25] The success of Random Harvest led MGM to give Peters lead roles in other major pictures such as Assignment in Brittany (1943), in which she portrayed a French peasant girl.

[22] In early 1944, Peters was one of ten actors and actresses who were elevated from "featured player" status to the studio's official "star" category; the others included Esther Williams, Laraine Day, Kathryn Grayson, Van Johnson, Margaret O'Brien, Ginny Simms, Robert Walker, Gene Kelly, and George Murphy.

An official portrait taken of MGM's contracted players during this period prominently features Peters sharing the front row with the head of the studio himself, Louis B. Mayer, and alongside such actors as James Stewart, Mickey Rooney, Margaret Sullavan, Katharine Hepburn, Hedy Lamarr, and Greer Garson.

[26] In late 1944, Peters filmed Keep Your Powder Dry, a war drama co-starring Lana Turner and Laraine Day,[18] in which she portrayed the humble wife of a soldier.

[33] MGM continued to pay Peters a $100 weekly salary and medical expenses, but, unable to find suitable projects, she subsequently left the studio.

[4] The same year, Peters made her first public appearance since her accident at Ciro's in West Hollywood, attending the debut of Desi Arnaz and His Orchestra along with her close friend Lucille Ball.

[35] Actor and friend Charles Bickford suggested that Peters option the novel The Sign of the Ram by Margaret Ferguson, which centers on a disabled woman who manipulates those around her.

[39][40] The Sign of the Ram was released in March 1948, and critic Bosley Crowther of The New York Times gave the film an unfavorable review, writing: "The fortitude of Susan Peters in returning to the screen after a cruelly crippling accident, suffered three years ago, is worthy of a more substantial token of respect than it—and she—receives in The Sign of the Ram, a Columbia picture which came to Loew's State yesterday.

[4] In 1949, she was cast as Laura in a touring stage production of The Glass Menagerie (reportedly with blessings from Tennessee Williams) which had its debut June 27, 1949, in Norwich, Connecticut.

[52] In mid-1952, Peters was admitted to a hospital in Exeter, California, to undergo a skin graft procedure, after which she returned to her brother's home and lived in seclusion.

[50] Film scholar Gene Blottner similarly praised Peters as a "brilliant actress,"[30] as did John Charles of Turner Classic Movies, who deemed her paralysis "one of the worst tragedies to affect the Hollywood acting community during the 1940s.