American actress of the 1940's and 50's, a former Esquire model and wartime pin-up girl. She got her start in Hollywood via a scholarship to the Max Reinhardt workshop on the strength of being 'The Coca Cola Girl' and elected 'ad queen of Chicago'. Her first starring role on stage was in 'Seventeen' in 1940. Her subsequent film career was desultory and after a year under contract to Paramount as a stock bit part player, she protested by changing her name from Alicia Brandes to Rebel Randell. While she did eventually appear in several minor films, Rebel became a much bigger star on radio in the 1950's. The only female DJ in Hollywood, she broadcast (at KCBS) for the American Forces Radio Service as hostess of 'Radio Calling' and, later, 'Jukebox, USA'. She was popularly known as 'Miss Double Distilled Honey' and 'The Girl whose Voice could Melt an Iceberg'. Rebel also made headlines as a result of several stormy failed marriages: twice to radio personality William M. Moore (aka Peter Potter) and a particularly acrimonious third to actor/salesman Glenn Thompson.
Popular G.I. pin-up girl during the 1940s and did several layouts, including one for Esquire magazine.
Was a disc jockey for the Armed Forces Radio Services and hosted a show called "Radio Calling".
In the 1950s she discovered that a New Orleans stripper began using her name, and she had to take legal action to stop her.
According to an interview with Mike Barnum in the December 2009 issue of "Classic Images", she got her initial start after winning a scholarship to the Max Reinhardt Workshop in Hollywood, where she appeared as Queen Titania in a version of "A Midsummer Night's Dream".
Was a John Robert Powers model before going to Hollywood.
Born and raised in Chicago, and graduated from Foreman High School.
In the Fall of 1952, she found big success as Hollywood's only female disc jockey with her Armed Forces Radio Service program "America Calling" on KCBS. She claimed she had the world's biggest telephone bill - at least $2,000 a month. Between records, she awarded a free phone call to a GI overseas and his family at home. She paid those bills herself. Only one minute of the phone call was heard on the air, after which the bosomy disc jockey lets the rest of the conversation be private from the estimated radio audience of 244,000,000. It also garnished the most mail received as well.
She was a lifelong conservative Republican.
In 1949, she was named "The Most Beautiful Girl on TV" and "The Glamour Girl of Hollywood".
She was crowned "Movie Glamour Girl of 1940" by the Motion Pictures Still Photographers Association.
She is buried at Desert Memorial Park, Cathedral City, CA.