name	Rita Hayworth
birth name	Margarita Carmen Cansino
birth date	October 17, 1918
birth place	Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
death date	May 14, 1987
death place	New York City, New York, U.S.
occupation	Actress, dancer
years active	1934–1972
spouse	Edward C. Judson (1937–1942)Orson Welles (1943–1948)Prince Aly Khan (1949–1953)Dick Haymes (1953–1955)James Hill (1958–1961)
children	Rebecca Welles (b. December 17, 1944)Yasmin Aga Khan (b. December 28, 1949)
parents	Eduardo Cansino, Sr.Volga Hayworth
relatives	Eduardo Cansino, Jr.(brother, deceased)
nationality	American
signature	Rita Hayworth signature.svg }}

Rita Hayworth (born Margarita Carmen Cansino; October 17, 1918May 14, 1987) was an American dancer and film actress who garnered fame during the 1940s as one of the era's top stars. Appearing first as Rita Cansino, she agreed to change her name to Rita Hayworth and her hair color to dark red to attract a greater range in roles. Her appeal led to her being featured on the cover of ''Life'' magazine five times, beginning in 1940.

The first dancer featured on film as a partner of both the stars Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly, Hayworth appeared in a total of 61 films over 37 years. She is listed by the American Film Institute as one of the 100 Greatest Stars of All Time.

Early life[link]

Hayworth was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1918 as Margarita Carmen Cansino, the oldest child of two dancers, Eduardo Cansino, Sr., from Castilleja de la Cuesta, a little town near Seville, Spain, and Volga Hayworth, an American of Irish-English descent who had performed with the Ziegfeld Follies. The Catholic couple had married in 1917. They also had two sons: Eduardo, Jr. and Vernon.

Margarita's father wanted her to become a professional dancer, while her mother hoped she would become an actress. Her paternal grandfather Antonio Cansino was renowned as a Spanish classical dancer; he popularized the bolero and his dancing school in Madrid was world famous. Rita later recalled,

From the time I was three and a half ... as soon as I could stand on my own feet, I was given dance lessons." I didn't like it very much ... but I didn't have the courage to tell my father, so I began taking the lessons. Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse, that was my girlhood.

She attended dance classes every day for a few years in a Carnegie Hall complex, where she was taught by her uncle Angel Cansino. She performed publicly from the age of six. In 1926 at the age of eight, she was featured in ''La Fiesta'', a short film for Warner Bros..

In 1927, her father took the family to Hollywood. He believed that dancing could be featured in the movies and that his family could be part of it. He established his own dance studio, where he taught such Hollywood luminaries as James Cagney and Jean Harlow. During the Great Depression, he lost all his investments, as musicals were no longer in vogue and commercial interest in his dancing classes waned. He partnered with his daughter to form "The Dancing Cansinos". Since under California law, Margarita was too young to work in nightclubs and bars, her father took her with him to work across the border in Tijuana, Mexico. In the early 1930s, it was a popular tourist spot for people from Los Angeles. Due to her working, Cansino never graduated from high school; she completed ninth grade at Hamilton High in Los Angeles.

At the age of 16, Cansino took a bit part in the film ''Cruz Diablo'' (1934), which led to another in ''In Caliente'' (1935) with the Mexican actress Dolores del Río. Cansino danced with her father in such nightspots as the Foreign and the Caliente clubs. Winfield Sheehan, the head of the Fox Film Corporation, saw her dancing at the Caliente Club and quickly arranged for Hayworth to do a screen test a week later. Impressed by her screen persona, Sheehan signed her for a short-term six-month contract at Fox, under the name Rita Cansino, the first of name changes for her film career.

Film career[link]

During her time at Fox, Cansino appeared in five pictures, in non-notable roles. By the end of her six-month contract, Fox had merged into 20th Century Fox, with Darryl F. Zanuck serving as the executive producer. Dismissing Sheehan's interest in Cansino, Zanuck did not renew her contract. Feeling that Cansino had screen potential, the salesman and promoter Edward C. Judson, whom she would marry in 1936, got her the lead roles in several independent films and arranged a screen test with Columbia Pictures. The studio head Harry Cohn signed Cansino to a long-term contract, and cast her in small roles in Columbia features.

Often cast as the exotic foreigner, Cansino appeared in several roles in 1935: in ''Dante's Inferno'', with Spencer Tracy; and ''Paddy O'Day,'' in which she played a Russian dancer. She was an Argentinian in ''Under the Pampas Moon'' and an Egyptian beauty in ''Charlie Chan in Egypt.'' In 1936 she took her first starring role as a "Latin type" in ''Human Cargo.'' Cohn argued that Cansino's image was too Mediterranean, which reduced her opportunities to being cast in "exotic" roles, more limited in number. With Cohn and Judson's encouragement, Hayworth changed her hair color to dark red and her name to Rita Hayworth. She had electrolysis to raise her hairline and broaden the appearance of her forehead. By using her mother's maiden name, she led people to see her British-American ancestry and became a classic "American" pin-up.

In 1937, Hayworth appeared in five minor Columbia pictures and three minor independent movies. The following year, she appeared in five Columbia B films. In 1939, Cohn pressured director Howard Hawks to use Hayworth for a small but important role as a man-trap in the aviation drama ''Only Angels Have Wings,'' in which she played opposite Cary Grant and Jean Arthur. With this film's box-office success, fan mail for Hayworth began pouring into Columbia's publicity department. Cohn began to see Hayworth as his first and official new star. The studio never officially had stars under contract, except for Jean Arthur, who was trying to break with it.

Cohn began to build Hayworth up in 1940, in features such as ''Music in My Heart,'' ''The Lady in Question,'' and ''Angels Over Broadway.'' That year she was first featured in a ''Life'' magazine photo. He loaned Hayworth to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to appear in ''Susan and God,'' opposite Joan Crawford. While on loan to Warner Brothers, Hayworth appeared as the second female lead in ''The Strawberry Blonde'' (1941), opposite James Cagney and Olivia de Havilland. As the film was a big box-office success, Hayworth's popularity rose; she immediately became one of Hollywood's hottest properties. So impressed was Warner Brothers that they tried to buy Hayworth's contract from Columbia, but Cohn refused to release her. Her success led to a supporting role in ''Blood and Sand'' (1941), opposite Tyrone Power and Linda Darnell, with Fox, the studio that had dropped her six years before. In one of her most notable screen roles, Hayworth played Doña Sol des Muire, the first of many screen sirens. This was another box-office hit.

She returned in triumph to Columbia Pictures and was cast in the musical ''You'll Never Get Rich'' (1941) opposite Fred Astaire, in one of the highest-budgeted films Columbia had ever made. So successful was the picture that the following year, the studio produced and released another Astaire-Hayworth picture, ''You Were Never Lovelier.'' In 1942, Hayworth also appeared in two other pictures, ''Tales of Manhattan'' and ''My Gal Sal''.

During this period, Hayworth was featured in an August 1941 ''Life Magazine'' photo, in which she lounged seductively in a black-lace negligee. When the U.S. joined World War II in December 1941, the photo made Hayworth one of the top two "pin-up girls" of the war years; the other was the blonde Betty Grable. In 2002, the satin nightgown Hayworth wore for the photo sold for $26,888.

Peak years at Columbia[link]

In 1944, Hayworth made one of her best-known films, the Technicolor musical ''Cover Girl'' (1944), with Gene Kelly. The film established her as Columbia's top star of the 1940s. For three consecutive years, starting in 1944, Hayworth was named one of the top movie box office attractions in the world. She was adept in ballet, tap, ballroom, and Spanish routines.

Cohn continued to showcase Hayworth's dance talents; she was the first dancer featured on film to partner with both Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly. Columbia featured her in the Technicolor films: ''Tonight and Every Night'' (1945), with Lee Bowman; and ''Down to Earth'' (1947), with Larry Parks.

Her erotic appeal was most noted in Charles Vidor's black and white film noir ''Gilda'' (1946), with Glenn Ford, which caused censors some consternation. The role, in which Hayworth in black satin performed a legendary one-glove striptease, made her into a cultural icon as a ''femme fatale.'' While her film was still in release, extensive publicity linked her to a widely covered nuclear bomb test in the South Pacific.

Numerous reporters from hundreds of papers across the country were covering preparations in 1946 at Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean's Marshall Islands for testing of the first nuclear bomb after World War II. The United States had been the first nation to use nuclear bombs, against the civilian population of Japan. Reporters publicized that young scientists had put the name of "Gilda" and Hayworth's image on the bomb, alluding to her bombshell status as a film star. Coverage varied widely at the time, but the story stuck that her image had been put on the bomb, and was repeated in her 1987 obituary in ''The New York Times,'' which readers relied on as fact. Her husband Orson Welles issued a public statement at the time, saying they would be pleased only if this were the last bomb test ever. Hayworth was furious to be used in this way.

Her biographer Barbara Leaming had a later interview with Welles in which he recalled,

"... the angriest was when she found out that they’d put her on the atom bomb. Rita almost went insane, she was so angry. She was so shocked by it! Rita was the kind of person that kind of thing would hurt more than anybody. She wanted to go to Washington to hold a press conference, but Harry Cohn (president of Columbia Pictures) wouldn’t let her because it would be unpatriotic.”

Recent research documents that only the name "Gilda" was put on the bomb; no image of Hayworth was used. A year later, Hayworth's performance in ''The Lady from Shanghai'' (1947), directed by her husband Orson Welles, was critically acclaimed. The film's failure at the box office was attributed in part to Welles' having had Hayworth's famous red hair cut short and dyed platinum blonde for the role. Cohn had not been consulted and was furious that Hayworth's image was changed.

Also in 1947, Hayworth was featured in a ''Life'' cover story by Winthrop Sargeant, which led to her nickname as "The "Love Goddess". This term was adopted and used later as the title of a biopic and of a biography about her. In a 1980s interview, Hayworth said, "Everybody else does nude scenes, but I don't. I never made nude movies. I didn't have to do that. I danced. I was provocative, I guess, in some things. But I was not completely exposed."

Her next film, ''The Loves of Carmen'' (1948), again with Glenn Ford, was the first film co-produced by Columbia and Hayworth's own production company, The Beckworth Corporation (named for her and Orson's daughter Rebecca); it was Columbia's biggest moneymaker for that year. She received a percentage of the profits from this and all her subsequent films until 1955, when she dissolved Beckworth to pay off debts she owed to Columbia.

Struggles with Columbia[link]

Hayworth had a strained relationship with Columbia Pictures for many years. In 1943, she was suspended without pay for nine weeks because she refused to appear in ''Once Upon a Time ''. (During this period in Hollywood, actors did not get to choose their films; they were on salary rather than receiving a fixed amount per picture.)

In 1947, Hayworth's new contract with Columbia provided a salary of US$250,000 plus 50% of film profits. In 1951 Columbia alleged it had $800,000 invested in properties for her, including the film she walked out on that year. She left Hollywood to marry Prince Aly Khan. She was suspended for failing to report to work on the film ''Affair in Trinidad.''

In 1952 she refused to report for work because "she objected to the script." In 1955, she sued to get out of a contract with the studio, but asked for her $150,000 salary, alleging filming failed to start when agreed. She said,

I was in Switzerland when they sent me the script for ''Affair in Trinidad'' and I threw it across the room. But I did the picture, and ''Pal Joey'' too. I came back to Columbia because I wanted to work and first, see, I had to finish that goddamn contract, which is how Harry Cohn ''owned'' me!" "Harry Cohn thought of me as one of the people he could exploit," said Hayworth, "and make a lot of money. And I did make a lot of money for him, but not much for me.

Years after her film career had ended and Cohn was dead, Hayworth still resented her treatment by him and Columbia.

I used to have to punch a time clock at Columbia ... Every day of my life. That's what it was like. I was under exclusive contract, like they owned me ... I think he had my dressing room bugged ... He was very possessive of me as a person, he didn't want me to go out with anybody, have any friends. No one can live that way. So I fought him ... You want to know what I think of Harry Cohn? He was a monster.

Hayworth resented that the studio failed to train her to sing or to encourage her to learn how to sing. Although she appeared to sing in many of her films, she was usually dubbed. As the public did not know the secret, she was embarrassed to be asked to sing by troops at USO shows. She complained that:

I wanted to study singing, but Harry Cohn kept saying, 'Who needs it?' and the studio wouldn't pay for it. They had me so intimidated that I couldn't have done it anyway. They always said, 'Oh, no, we can't let you do it. There's no time for that; it has to be done right now!' I was under contract, and that was it.

Cohn had a reputation as a taskmaster, but he had his own criticisms of Hayworth. He had invested heavily in her before she began a reckless affair with the married Aly Khan, and it could have caused a backlash against her career and Columbia's success. For instance, an article in the British ''The People'' called for a boycott of Hayworth's films. It said, "Hollywood must be told its already tarnished reputation will sink to rock bottom if it restores this reckless woman to a place among its stars." Cohn expressed his frustration with Hayworth's judgment in an interview with ''Time'' magazine.

Hayworth might be worth ten million dollars today easily! She owned 25% of the profits with her own company and had hit after hit and she had to get married and had to get out of the business and took a suspension because she fell in love again! In five years, at two pictures a year, at 25%! Think of what she could have made! But she didn't make pictures! She took two or three suspensions! She got mixed up with different characters! Unpredictable!

Later career[link]

After the collapse of her marriage to Aly Khan in 1951, Hayworth returned to the United States with great fanfare, where she starred in a string of hit films: ''Affair in Trinidad'' (1952) with favorite co-star Glenn Ford; and in 1953 had two films released: ''Salome,'' with Charles Laughton and Stewart Granger; and ''Miss Sadie Thompson,'' with José Ferrer and Aldo Ray. Her performance in the latter film won critical acclaim.

She was off the big screen for another four years, due mainly to a tumultuous marriage to the singer Dick Haymes. After making ''Fire Down Below'' (1957) with Robert Mitchum and Jack Lemmon, and her last musical ''Pal Joey'' (1957) with Frank Sinatra and Kim Novak, Hayworth finally left Columbia.

She received good reviews for her acting in ''Separate Tables'' (1958), with Burt Lancaster and David Niven, and ''The Story on Page One'' (1960) with Anthony Franciosa. She continued working throughout the 1960s. In 1962, her planned Broadway debut in ''Step on a Crack'' was cancelled for undisclosed health reasons. She continued to act in films until the early 1970s. She made a well-publicized 1971 television appearance on ''The Carol Burnett Show''. Her last film was ''The Wrath of God'' (1972).

Beauty[link]

Hayworth was a top glamour girl in the 1940s, a pin-up girl for military servicemen and a beauty icon for women. At 5'6" (168 cm) and 120 lb (55 kgs) she was tall enough for her height to be a concern for dancing partners such as Fred Astaire. Hayworth got her big motion picture break because she was willing to change her hair color, whereas other actresses were not. She reportedly changed her hair color eight times in eight movies.

In 1949 Hayworth's lips were voted best in the world by the Artists League of America. She had a modeling contract with Max Factor to promote its Tru-Color lipsticks and Pan-Stik make-up.

Barbara Leaming writes in her biography of Hayworth, ''If This Was Happiness: A Biography of Rita Hayworth'' (1989) that, due to her fondness for alcohol and the stresses of her life, Hayworth aged before her time. Re-appearing in New York in 1956 to begin work on her first film in three years, Hayworth was described by the following: "despite the artfully applied make-up and shoulder-length red hair, there was no concealing the ravages of drink and stress. Deep lines had crept around her eyes and mouth, and she appeared worn, exhausted, older than her thirty-eight years." Leaming wrote that during the filming of ''Fire Down Below,'' Hayworth heard a comment that she should hurry up as "no amount of time was going to make her look any younger." In San Francisco the following year filming ''Pal Joey,'' she was signing autographs when she heard a fan say, "She looks so old."

Personal life[link]

In 1941 Hayworth said she was the antithesis of the characters she played. "I naturally am very shy ... and I suffer from an inferiority complex." She once complained that "[M]en fell in love with Gilda, but they wake up with me." In 1970 she remarked that the only films she could watch without laughing were the dance musicals she made with Fred Astaire. "I guess the only jewels of my life," Hayworth said, "were the pictures I made with Fred Astaire."

Hayworth's two younger brothers, Vernon and Eduardo Cansino, Jr., both served in World War II. Vernon left the U.S. Army in 1946 with several medals, including the Purple Heart, and later married Susan Vail, a dancer. Eduardo Cansino, Jr. followed Hayworth into acting; he was also under contract with Columbia Pictures. In 1950 he made his screen debut in ''Magic Carpet''.

Marriage and family[link]

Hayworth was married and divorced five times. She said, "Basically, I am a good, gentle person, but I am attracted to mean personalities."

Edward Charles Judson (1937–1942): When Hayworth was 18, she married Edward Judson in 1937, an oilman turned promoter who was more than twice her age. They eloped in Las Vegas. He had played a major role in launching her acting career. A shrewd businessman, he was domineering and became her manager for months before he proposed. "He helped me with my career," Hayworth conceded after they divorced, "and helped himself to my money." She alleged Judson compelled her to transfer considerable property to him and promise to pay him $12,000 under threats that he would do her "great bodily harm." She filed for divorce from him on February 24, 1942, with the complaint of cruelty. She noted to the press that his work took him to Oklahoma and Texas, while she lived and worked in Hollywood. Judson was as old as her father, who was enraged by the marriage, which caused a rift between Hayworth and her parents until the divorce. Judson had failed to tell Hayworth before they married that he had previously been twice married. When she left him, she literally had no money. She asked her friend, Hermes Pan, if she could eat at his home.

Orson Welles (1943–1948): Hayworth married Orson Welles on September 7, 1943. None of her colleagues knew about the planned marriage (before a judge) until she announced it the day before they got married. For the civil ceremony, she wore a beige suit, ruffled white blouse, and a veil. A few hours after they got married, they returned to work at the studio. They had a daughter, Rebecca (1944–2004). They struggled in their marriage. Hayworth said that Welles did not want to be tied down:

During the entire period of our marriage he showed no interest in establishing a home. When I suggested purchasing a home, he told me he didn't want the responsibility. Mr. Welles told me he never should have married in the first place; that it interfered with his freedom in his way of life.

Prince Aly Khan (1949–1953): In 1948 she left her film career to marry Prince Aly Khan a son of Sultan Mahommed Shah, Aga Khan III, the leader of the Ismaili sect of Shia Islam. They were married on May 27, 1949. Her bridal trousseau was Dior's New Look.

Aly Khan and his family were heavily involved in horse racing, owning and racing horses. Hayworth had no interest in the sport but became a member of the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club. Her filly Double Rose won several races in France and notably finished second in the 1949 Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe.

In 1951, while still married to Hayworth, Khan was spotted dancing with the actress Joan Fontaine in the nightclub where he and his wife had met. Hayworth threatened to divorce him in Reno, Nevada. In early May she moved to Nevada to establish legal residence to qualify for a divorce. She stayed at Lake Tahoe with their daughter, saying there was a threat that the child would be kidnapped. Hayworth filed for divorce from Khan on September 2, 1951, on the grounds of "extreme cruelty, entirely mental in nature."

Hayworth once said she might convert to Islam but did not. During the custody fight over their daughter Princess Yasmin Aga Khan, the Prince said he wanted her raised as a Muslim; Hayworth (who had been raised a Roman Catholic) wanted the child to be a Christian.

Hayworth rejected his offer of $1,000,000 if she would rear Yasmin as a Muslim from age seven and allow her to go to Europe to visit with him for two or three months each year.

"Nothing will make me give up Yasmin's chance to live here in America among our precious freedoms and habits," declared Hayworth. "While I respect the Muslim faith and all other faiths it is my earnest wish that my daughter be raised as a normal, healthy American girl in the Christian faith. There isn't any amount of money in the entire world for which it is worth sacrificing this child's privilege of living as a normal Christian girl here in the United States. There just isn't anything else in the world that can compare with her sacred chance to do that. And I'm going to give it to Yasmin regardless of what it costs."

Dick Haymes (1953–1955): When Hayworth and Haymes first met, he was still married and his singing career was waning. When she showed up at the clubs, he got a larger audience. Haymes was desperate for money, as two of his former wives were taking legal action against him for unpaid child support. His financial problems were so bad he could not return to California without being arrested. On July 7, 1954, his ex-wife Nora Haymes got a bench warrant for his arrest, because he owed her $3,800 in alimony. Less than a week prior, his other ex-wife, Joanne Dru, also got a bench warrant because she said he owed $4,800 in support payments for their three children. Hayworth ended up paying most of Haymes's debts.

Haymes was born in Argentina, and did not have solid proof of American citizenship. Not long after he met Hayworth, US officials initiated proceedings to have him deported to Argentina for being an illegal alien. He hoped Hayworth could influence the government and keep him in the United States. When she assumed responsibility for his citizenship, a bond was formed that led to marriage. The two were married on September 24, 1953 at the Sands Hotel, Las Vegas, and their wedding procession went through the casino.

From the start of their marriage, Haymes was deeply indebted to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). When Hayworth took time off from attending his comeback performances in Philadelphia, the audiences sharply declined. Haymes's $5000 weekly salary was attached by the IRS to pay a $100,000 bill, and he was unable to pay his pianist. Haymes' ex-wives demanded money while Hayworth publicly bemoaned her own lack of alimony from Aly Khan. At one point, the couple was effectively imprisoned in a hotel room for 24 hours in Manhattan at the Hotel Madison as sheriff's deputies waited outside threatening to arrest Haymes for outstanding debts. At the same time, Hayworth was fighting a severe custody battle with Khan, during which she reported death threats against their children. While living in New York, Hayworth sent the children to live with their nanny in Westchester County. They were found and photographed by a reporter from ''Confidential'' magazine.

After a tumultuous two years together, Haymes struck Hayworth in the face in 1955 in public at the Coconut Grove nightclub in Los Angeles. Hayworth packed her bags, walked out, and never returned. The assault and crisis shook her, and her doctor ordered her to remain in bed for several days.

Hayworth was short of money after her marriage to Haymes. She had failed to gain child support from Aly Khan. She sued Orson Welles for back payment of child support which she claimed had never been paid. This effort was unsuccessful and added to her stress.

James Hill (1958–1961): Hayworth began a relationship with film producer James Hill, whom she went on to marry on February 2, 1958. He put her in one of her last major films, ''Separate Tables''. On September 1, 1961, Hayworth filed for divorce, alleging extreme mental cruelty. He later wrote ''Rita Hayworth: A Memoir,'' in which he suggested their marriage collapsed because he wanted Hayworth to continue making movies, while she wanted them both to retire from Hollywood.

In his book, ''In the Arena'', Charlton Heston writes about Hayworth's brief marriage to Hill. One night Heston and his wife Lydia joined the couple for dinner at a restaurant in Spain, with the director George Marshall and the actor Rex Harrison, Hayworth's co-star in ''The Happy Thieves''. Heston wrote that the occasion "turned into the single most embarrassing evening of my life", describing how Hill heaped "obscene abuse" on Hayworth until she was "reduced to a helpless flood of tears, her face buried in her hands". Heston writes how the others sat stunned, witnesses to a "marital massacre" and, though he was "strongly tempted to slug him" (Hill), Heston left with his wife Lydia after she stood up, almost in tears. Heston wrote, "I'm ashamed of walking away from Miss Hayworth's humiliation. I never saw her again."

Health problems[link]

Hayworth struggled with alcohol throughout her life. Her daughter Yasmin Aga Khan said,

"I remember as a child that she had a drinking problem. She had difficulty coping with the ups and downs of the business ... As a child, I thought, 'She has a drinking problem and she's an alcoholic.' That was very clear and I thought, 'Well, there's not much I can do. I can just, sort of, stand by and watch.' It's very difficult, seeing your mother, going through her emotional problems and drinking and then behaving in that manner ... Her condition became quite bad. It worsened and she did have an alcoholic breakdown and landed in the hospital."

In 1972, Hayworth was 54 years old and wanted to retire from acting, but she needed money so signed up for ''The Wrath of God''. The experience exposed her poor health and worsening mental state. As she could not remember lines, they filmed her scenes one line at a time.

The following year Hayworth agreed to do one more movie, ''Tales That Witness Madness'' (1973). Due to worse health, she abandoned the movie set, and returned to the United States. She never returned to acting.

In March 1974, both her brothers died within a week of each other, which caused her great sadness and led to heavy drinking. In 1976 at London's Heathrow Airport, Hayworth was removed from a TWA flight after having an angry outburst while traveling with her agent. "Miss Hayworth had been drinking when she boarded the plane," revealed a TWA flight attendant, "and had several free drinks during the flight." The event attracted much negative publicity; a disturbing photograph was published in newspapers.

Hayworth's alcoholism hid symptoms of what was eventually understood to be Alzheimer's disease. "For several years in the 1970s, she had been misdiagnosed as an alcoholic." "It was the outbursts," said her daughter, "She'd fly into a rage. I can't tell you. I thought it was alcoholism-alcoholic dementia. We all thought that. The papers picked that up, of course. You can't imagine the relief just in getting a diagnosis. We had a name at last, Alzheimer's! Of course, that didn't really come until the last seven or eight years. She wasn't diagnosed as having Alzheimer's until 1980. There were two decades of hell before that."

In July 1981, Hayworth's health had deteriorated to the point where a judge in Los Angeles Superior Court ruled that she should be placed under the care of her daughter, Princess Yasmin Khan of New York City. Hayworth lived in an apartment at The San Remo on Central Park West next to her daughter, who arranged for care for her mother through her final years.

Death[link]

Rita Hayworth lapsed into a semicoma in February 1987. She died at age 68 from Alzheimer's disease a few months later on May 14, 1987. A funeral service was held on May 19, 1987, at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills. Pallbearers included actors Ricardo Montalbán, Glenn Ford, Don Ameche and the choreographer Hermes Pan. She was interred in Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City. Her headstone includes the inscription: "To yesterday's companionship and tomorrow's reunion."

"Rita Hayworth was one of our country's most beloved stars", said President Ronald Reagan, who had been an actor at the same time as Hayworth.

"Glamorous and talented, she gave us many wonderful moments on stage and screen and delighted audiences from the time she was a young girl. In her later years, Rita became known for her struggle with Alzheimer's disease. Her courage and candor, and that of her family, were a great public service in bringing worldwide attention to a disease which we all hope will soon be cured. Nancy and I are saddened by Rita's death. She was a friend who we will miss. We extend our deep sympathy to her family."

Awards[link]

Nomination for Best Actress - Motion Picture Drama in ''Circus World'' (1964) (U.K. title: ''Magnificent Showman''), which also featured John Wayne.

1977, National Screen Heritage Award.

Hayworth is included as one of the American Film Institute's Greatest Stars of All Time.

Legacy[link]

A fund raiser for the Alzheimer's Association is named in her honor by her daughter, Yasmin Aga Khan, who has been the hostess for these events and a major sponsor of Alzheimer's Disease charities and awareness programs.

The film ''I Remember Better When I Paint'' (2009) describes how Hayworth took up painting while struggling with Alzheimer's and produced art.

In popular culture[link]

Lynda Carter portrayed Hayworth in the television movie ''Rita Hayworth: The Love Goddess'' (1983).

Actress Veronica Watt portrayed her in the film ''Hollywoodland'' (2006).

In ''LA Confidential'' (1997), Pierce Patchett says: "I needed a Rita Hayworth to fill out my little studio."

Filmography[link]

As Rita Cansino[link]

''La Fiesta'' (Short subject, 1926) ''Cruz Diablo'' aka ''The Devil's Cross'' (Uncredited, 1934) ''In Caliente'' (1935)

''Under the Pampas Moon'' (1935)

''Charlie Chan in Egypt'' (1935)

''Dante's Inferno'' (1935)

''Paddy O'Day'' (1935)

''HumanCargo'' (1936)

''Meet Nero Wolfe'' (1936)

''Rebellion'' (1936)

''The Dancing Pirate'' (1936)

''Old Louisiana'' (1937)

''Hit the Saddle'' (1937)

''Trouble in Texas'' (1937)

As Rita Hayworth[link]

''Criminals of the Air'' (1937)

''Girls Can Play'' (1937)

''The Game That Kills'' (1937)

''Paid to Dance'' (1937)

''The Shadow'' (1937)

''Who Killed Gail Preston?'' (1938)

''Special Inspector'' (1938)

''There's Always a Woman'' (1938)

''Convicted'' (1938)

''Juvenile Court'' (1938)

''The Renegade Ranger'' (1938)

''Homicide Bureau'' (1939)

''The Lone Wolf Spy Hunt'' (1939)

''Only Angels Have Wings'' (1939)

''Music in My Heart'' (1940)

''Blondie on a Budget'' (1940)

''Susan and God'' (1940)

''The Lady in Question'' (1940)

''Angels Over Broadway'' (1940)

''The Strawberry Blonde'' (1941)

''Affectionately Yours'' (1941)

''Blood and Sand'' (1941)

''You'll Never Get Rich'' (1941)

''My Gal Sal'' (1942)

''Tales of Manhattan'' (1942)

''You Were Never Lovelier'' (1942)

''Show Business at War'' (1943) (short subject)

''Cover Girl'' (1944)

''Tonight and Every Night'' (1945)

''Gilda'' (1946)

''Down to Earth'' (1947)

''The Lady from Shanghai'' (1947)

''The Loves of Carmen'' (1948)

''Champagne Safari'' (1952)

''Affair in Trinidad'' (1952)

''Salome'' (1953)

''Miss Sadie Thompson'' (1953)

''Fire Down Below'' (1957)

''Pal Joey'' (1957)

''Separate Tables'' (1958)

''They Came to Cordura'' (1959)

''The Story on Page One'' (1959)

''The Happy Thieves'' (1962)

''Circus World'' (1964)

''The Money Trap'' (1965)

''The Poppy Is Also a Flower'' (1966)

''L'Avventuriero'' (1967)

''I Bastardi'' (1968)

''The Naked Zoo'' (1971)

''Road to Salina'' (1971)

''The Wrath of God'' (1972)

References[link]

Sources[link]

Kobal, John. ''Rita Hayworth: The Time, the Place, the Woman'' (1977). ISBN 0-393-07526-5

Leaming, Barbara. ''If This Was Happiness: A Biography of Rita Hayworth'' (New York: Viking, 1989)

McLean, Adrienne L. ''Being Rita Hayworth: Labor, Identity, and Hollywood Stardom'' (2004). ISBN 0-8135-3389-9

Morella, Joe and Epstein, Edward Z. ''Rita: The Life of Rita Hayworth'' (1983). ISBN 0-385-29265-1

Peary, Gerald. ''Rita Hayworth: A Pyramid Illustrated History of the Movies'' (1976). ISBN 0-515-04116-5

Ringgold, Gene. ''The Films of Rita Hayworth: The Legend and Career of a Love Goddess'' (1974). ISBN 0-8065-0439-0

Roberts-Frenzel, Caren. ''Rita Hayworth: A Photographic Retrospective'' (2001). ISBN 0-8109-1434-4

External links[link]

Category:1918 births Category:1987 deaths Category:20th-century actors Category:American dancers Category:American film actors Category:American television actors Category:American people of English descent Category:American people of Irish descent Category:American people of Spanish descent Category:American racehorse owners and breeders Category:Burials at Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City Category:Deaths from Alzheimer's disease Category:Disease-related deaths in New York Category:People from Brooklyn Category:People from the Greater Los Angeles Area Category:Qajar dynasty

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{{infobox person| name	Fred Astaire
birth name	Frederick Austerlitz
birth date	May 10, 1899
birth place	Omaha, Nebraska
death date	June 22, 1987
death place	Los Angeles, California
occupation	Actor, dancer, singer, choreographer, percussionist
years active	1904-1981
spouse	Phyllis Livingston Potter (m.1933-1954; her death) Robyn Smith (m.1980-1987; his death)
relatives	Adele Astaire(sister, deceased) }}

Fred Astaire (born Frederick Austerlitz; May 10, 1899 – June 22, 1987) was an American film and Broadway stage dancer, choreographer, singer and actor. His stage and subsequent film career spanned a total of 76 years, during which he made 31 musical films. He was named the fifth Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute. He is particularly associated with Ginger Rogers, with whom he made ten films.

Gene Kelly, another major innovator in filmed dance, said that "the history of dance on film begins with Astaire". Beyond film and television, many classical dancers and choreographers, Rudolf Nureyev, Sammy Davis, Jr., Michael Jackson, Gregory Hines, Mikhail Baryshnikov, George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins among them, also acknowledged his importance and influence.

Life and career[link]

1899–1917: Early life and career[link]

Astaire was born in Omaha, Nebraska, the son of Johanna "Ann" (née Geilus) and Frederic "Fritz" Austerlitz (born September 8, 1868, as Friedrich Emanuel Austerlitz). Astaire's mother was born in the United States to Lutheran German immigrants from East Prussia and Alsace, while Astaire's father was born in Linz, Austria, to Jewish parents who had converted to Catholicism.

After arriving in New York City at age 24 on October 26, 1892, and being inspected at Ellis Island, Astaire's father, hoping to find work in his brewing trade, moved to Omaha, Nebraska, and landed a job with the Storz Brewing Company. Astaire's mother dreamed of escaping Omaha by virtue of her children's talents, after Astaire's sister, Adele Astaire, early on revealed herself to be an instinctive dancer and singer. She planned a "brother-and-sister act," which was common in vaudeville at the time. Although Astaire refused dance lessons at first, he easily mimicked his older sister's step and took up piano, accordion and clarinet.

When their father suddenly lost his job, the family moved to New York City to launch the show business career of the children. Despite Adele and Fred's teasing rivalry, they quickly acknowledged their individual strengths, his durability and her greater talent. Fred and Adele's mother suggested they change their name to "Astaire," as she felt "Austerlitz" sounded as though it could be the name of a battle. They were taught dance, speaking, and singing in preparation for developing an act. Family legend attributes the name to an uncle surnamed "L'Astaire".

Their first act was called ''Juvenile Artists Presenting an Electric Musical Toe-Dancing Novelty''. Fred wore a top hat and tails in the first half and a lobster outfit in the second. The goofy act debuted in Keyport, New Jersey, in a "tryout theater." The local paper wrote, "the Astaires are the greatest child act in vaudeville."

As a result of their father's salesmanship, Fred and Adele rapidly landed a major contract and played the famed Orpheum Circuit not only in Omaha, but throughout the United States. Soon Adele grew to at least three inches taller than Fred and the pair began to look incongruous. The family decided to take a two-year break from show business to let time take its course and to avoid trouble from the Gerry Society and the child labor laws of the time. In 1912, Fred became an Episcopalian.

The career of the Astaire siblings resumed with mixed fortunes, though with increasing skill and polish, as they began to incorporate tap dancing into their routines. Astaire's dancing was inspired by Bill "Bojangles" Robinson and John "Bubbles" Sublett. From vaudeville dancer Aurelio Coccia, they learned the tango, waltz and other ballroom dances popularized by Vernon and Irene Castle.

Some sources state that the Astaire siblings appeared in a 1915 film entitled ''Fanchon, the Cricket'', starring Mary Pickford, but the Astaires have consistently denied this.

Fred Astaire first met George Gershwin, who was working as a song plugger in Jerome H. Remick's, in 1916. Fred had already been hunting for new music and dance ideas. Their chance meeting was to deeply affect the careers of both artists.

Astaire was always on the lookout for new steps on the circuit and was starting to demonstrate his ceaseless quest for novelty and perfection. The Astaires broke into Broadway in 1917 with ''Over the Top'', a patriotic revue. The Astaires performed for U.S. and Allied troops at this time too.

1917–1933: Stage career in Broadway and London[link]

They followed up with several more shows, and of their work in ''The Passing Show of 1918'' Heywood Broun wrote: "In an evening in which there was an abundance of good dancing, Fred Astaire stood out ... He and his partner, Adele Astaire, made the show pause early in the evening with a beautiful loose-limbed dance."

By this time, Astaire's dancing skill was beginning to outshine his sister's, though she still set the tone of their act and her sparkle and humor drew much of the attention, due in part to Fred's careful preparation and strong supporting choreography.

During the 1920s, Fred and Adele appeared on Broadway and on the London stage in shows such as George and Ira Gershwin's ''Lady Be Good'' (1924) and ''Funny Face'' (1927), and later in ''The Band Wagon'' (1931), winning popular acclaim with the theater crowd on both sides of the Atlantic. By then, Astaire's tap dancing was recognized as among the best, as Robert Benchley wrote in 1930, "I don't think that I will plunge the nation into war by stating that Fred is the greatest tap-dancer in the world."

After the close of ''Funny Face'', the Astaires went to Hollywood for a screen test (now lost) at Paramount Pictures, but were not considered suitable for films.

They split in 1932 when Adele married her first husband, Lord Charles Arthur Francis Cavendish, a son of the Duke of Devonshire. Fred Astaire went on to achieve success on his own on Broadway and in London with ''Gay Divorce'', while considering offers from Hollywood. The end of the partnership was traumatic for Astaire, but stimulated him to expand his range. Free of the brother-sister constraints of the former pairing and with a new partner (Claire Luce), he created a romantic partnered dance to Cole Porter's "Night and Day", which had been written for ''Gay Divorce''. Luce stated that she had to encourage him to take a more romantic approach: "Come on, Fred, I'm not your sister, you know." The success of the stage play was credited to this number, and when recreated in the film version of the play ''The Gay Divorcee'' (1934), it ushered in a new era in filmed dance. Recently, film footage taken by Fred Stone of Astaire performing in ''Gay Divorce'' with Luce's successor, Dorothy Stone, in New York in 1933 was uncovered by dancer and historian Betsy Baytos and now represents the earliest known performance footage of Astaire.

1933–1939: Astaire and Rogers at RKO[link]

According to Hollywood folklore, a screen test report on Astaire for RKO Radio Pictures, now lost along with the test, is reported to have read: "Can't sing. Can't act. Balding. Can dance a little." The producer of the Astaire-Rogers pictures, Pandro S. Berman, claimed he had never heard the story in the 1930s and that it only emerged years later. Astaire later insisted that the report had actually read: "Can't act. Slightly bald. ''Also dances''". In any case, the test was clearly disappointing, and David O. Selznick, who had signed Astaire to RKO and commissioned the test, stated in a memo, "I am uncertain about the man, but I feel, in spite of his enormous ears and bad chin line, that his charm is so tremendous that it comes through even on this wretched test." However, this did not affect RKO's plans for Astaire, first lending him for a few days to MGM in 1933 for his Hollywood debut, where he appeared as himself dancing with Joan Crawford in the successful musical film ''Dancing Lady''.

On his return to RKO, he got fifth billing after fourth billed Ginger Rogers in the 1933 Dolores del Río vehicle ''Flying Down to Rio''. In a review, ''Variety'' magazine attributed its massive success to Astaire's presence: "The main point of ''Flying Down to Rio'' is the screen promise of Fred Astaire ... He's assuredly a bet after this one, for he's distinctly likable on the screen, the mike is kind to his voice and as a dancer he remains in a class by himself. The latter observation will be no news to the profession, which has long admitted that Astaire starts dancing where the others stop hoofing."

Having already been linked to his sister Adele on stage, Astaire was initially very reluctant to become part of another dance team. He wrote his agent, "I don't mind making another picture with her, but as for this 'team' idea, it's 'out!' I've just managed to live down one partnership and I don't want to be bothered with any more." He was persuaded by the obvious public appeal of the Astaire-Rogers pairing. The partnership, and the choreography of Astaire and Hermes Pan, helped make dancing an important element of the Hollywood film musical. Astaire and Rogers made ten films together, including ''The Gay Divorcee'', ''Roberta'' (1935), ''Top Hat'' (1935), ''Follow the Fleet'' (1936), ''Swing Time'' (1936), ''Shall We Dance'' (1937), and ''Carefree'' (1938). Six out of the nine Astaire-Rogers musicals became the biggest moneymakers for RKO; all of the films brought a certain prestige and artistry that all studios coveted at the time. Their partnership elevated them both to stardom; as Katharine Hepburn reportedly said, "He gives her class and she gives him sex appeal."

Astaire received a percentage of the films' profits, something extremely rare in actors' contracts at that time; and complete autonomy over how the dances would be presented, allowing him to revolutionize dance on film.

Astaire is credited with two important innovations in early film musicals. First, he insisted that the (almost stationary) camera film a dance routine in a single shot, if possible, while holding the dancers in full view at all times. Astaire famously quipped: "Either the camera will dance, or I will." Astaire maintained this policy from ''The Gay Divorcee'' (1934) onwards (until overruled by Francis Ford Coppola, who directed ''Finian's Rainbow'' (1968), Astaire's last film musical). Astaire's style of dance sequences thus contrasted with the Busby Berkeley musicals, which were known for dance sequences filled with extravagant aerial shots, quick takes, and zooms on certain areas of the body, such as the arms or legs. Second, Astaire was adamant that all song and dance routines be seamlessly integrated into the plotlines of the film. Instead of using dance as spectacle as Busby Berkeley did, Astaire used it to move the plot along. Typically, an Astaire picture would include a solo performance by Astaire — which he termed his "sock solo" — a partnered comedy dance routine, and a partnered romantic dance routine.

Dance commentators Arlene Croce, Hannah Hyam and John Mueller consider Rogers to have been Astaire's greatest dance partner, while recognizing that some of his later partners displayed superior technical dance skills, a view shared by Hermes Pan and Stanley Donen. Film critic Pauline Kael adopts a more neutral stance, while ''Time'' magazine film critic Richard Schickel writes "The nostalgia surrounding Rogers-Astaire tends to bleach out other partners."

Mueller sums up Rogers's abilities as follows: "Rogers was outstanding among Astaire's partners not because she was superior to others as a dancer, but because, as a skilled, intuitive actress, she was cagey enough to realize that acting did not stop when dancing began ... the reason so many women have fantasized about dancing with Fred Astaire is that Ginger Rogers conveyed the impression that dancing with him is the most thrilling experience imaginable." According to Astaire, "Ginger had never danced with a partner before ["Flying Down to Rio"]. She faked it an awful lot. She couldn't tap and she couldn't do this and that ... but Ginger had style and talent and improved as she went along. She got so that after a while everyone else who danced with me looked wrong."

For her part, Rogers described Astaire's uncompromising standards extending to the whole production, "Sometimes he'll think of a new line of dialogue or a new angle for the story ... they never know what time of night he'll call up and start ranting enthusiastically about a fresh idea ... No loafing on the job on an Astaire picture, and no cutting corners."

Astaire was still unwilling to have his career tied exclusively to any partnership, however. He negotiated with RKO to strike out on his own with ''A Damsel in Distress'' in 1937 with an inexperienced, non-dancing Joan Fontaine, unsuccessfully as it turned out. He returned to make two more films with Rogers, ''Carefree'' (1938) and ''The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle'' (1939). While both films earned respectable gross incomes, they both lost money due to increased production costs and Astaire left RKO. Rogers remained and went on to become the studio's hottest property in the early forties. They were reunited in 1949 at MGM for their final outing, ''The Barkleys of Broadway''.

1940–1947: Drifting to an early retirement[link]

In 1939, Astaire left RKO to freelance and pursue new film opportunities, with mixed though generally successful outcomes. Throughout this period, Astaire continued to value the input of choreographic collaborators and, unlike the 1930s when he worked almost exclusively with Hermes Pan, he tapped the talents of other choreographers in an effort to continually innovate. His first post-Ginger dance partner was the redoubtable Eleanor Powell — considered the finest female tap-dancer of her generation — in ''Broadway Melody of 1940'' where they performed a celebrated extended dance routine to Cole Porter's "Begin the Beguine". In his autobiography ''Steps in Time'', Astaire remarked, "She 'put 'em down like a man', no ricky-ticky-sissy stuff with Ellie. She really knocked out a tap dance in a class by herself."

He played alongside Bing Crosby in ''Holiday Inn'' (1942) and later ''Blue Skies'' (1946), but in spite of the enormous financial success of both, was reportedly dissatisfied with roles where he lost the girl to Crosby. The former film is particularly remembered for his virtuoso solo dance to "Let's Say it with Firecrackers" while the latter film featured an innovative song and dance routine to a song indelibly associated with him: "Puttin' on the Ritz". Other partners during this period included Paulette Goddard in ''Second Chorus'' (1940), in which he dance-conducted the Artie Shaw orchestra.

He made two pictures with Rita Hayworth, the daughter of his former vaudeville dance idols, the Cansinos: the first ''You'll Never Get Rich'' (1941) catapulted Hayworth to stardom and provided Astaire with his first opportunity to integrate Latin-American dance idioms into his style, taking advantage of Hayworth's professional Latin dance pedigree. His second film with Hayworth, ''You Were Never Lovelier'' (1942) was equally successful, and featured a duet to Kern's "I'm Old Fashioned" which became the centerpiece of Jerome Robbins's 1983 New York City Ballet tribute to Astaire. He next appeared opposite the seventeen-year-old Joan Leslie in the wartime drama ''The Sky's the Limit'' (1943) where he introduced Arlen and Mercer's "One for My Baby" while dancing on a bar counter in a dark and troubled routine. This film which was choreographed by Astaire alone and achieved modest box office success, represented an important departure for Astaire from his usual charming happy-go-lucky screen persona and confused contemporary critics.

His next partner, Lucille Bremer, was featured in two lavish vehicles, both directed by Vincente Minnelli: the fantasy ''Yolanda and the Thief'' which featured an avant-garde surrealistic ballet, and the musical revue ''Ziegfeld Follies'' (1946) which featured a memorable teaming of Astaire with Gene Kelly to "The Babbit and the Bromide", a Gershwin song Astaire had introduced with his sister Adele back in 1927. While ''Follies'' was a hit, ''Yolanda'' bombed at the box office and Astaire, ever insecure and believing his career was beginning to falter surprised his audiences by announcing his retirement during the production of ''Blue Skies'' (1946), nominating "Puttin' on the Ritz" as his farewell dance.

After announcing his retirement in 1946, Astaire concentrated on his horse-racing interests and went on to found the Fred Astaire Dance Studios in 1947 — which he subsequently sold in 1966.

1948–1957: Productive years with MGM and second retirement[link]

thumb|In ''Daddy Long Legs'' (1955)However, he soon returned to the big screen to replace the injured Kelly in ''Easter Parade'' opposite Judy Garland, Ann Miller and Peter Lawford, and for a final reunion with Rogers in ''The Barkleys of Broadway'' (1949). He then went on to make more musicals throughout the 1950s: ''Let's Dance'' (1950) with Betty Hutton, ''Royal Wedding'' (1951) with Jane Powell, ''Three Little Words'' (1950) and ''The Belle of New York'' (1952) with Vera-Ellen, ''The Band Wagon'' (1953) and ''Silk Stockings'' (1957) with Cyd Charisse, ''Daddy Long Legs'' (1955) with Leslie Caron, and ''Funny Face'' (1957) with Audrey Hepburn.

During 1952 Astaire recorded ''The Astaire Story'', a four-volume album with a quintet led by Oscar Peterson. The album provided a musical overview of Astaire's career, and was produced by Norman Granz. ''The Astaire Story'' later won the Grammy Hall of Fame Award in 1999, a special Grammy award to honor recordings that are at least twenty-five years old, and that have "qualitative or historical significance."

His legacy at this point was 30 musical films in 25 years. Afterwards, Astaire announced that he was retiring from dancing in film to concentrate on dramatic acting, scoring rave reviews for the nuclear war drama ''On the Beach'' (1959).

1958–1981: Branching out into televised dance and straight acting[link]

Astaire did not retire from dancing completely. He made a series of four highly rated Emmy Award-winning musical specials for television in 1958, 1959, 1960, and 1968, each featuring Barrie Chase, with whom Astaire enjoyed an Indian summer of dance creativity. The first of these programs, 1958's ''An Evening with Fred Astaire'', won nine Emmy Awards, including "Best Single Performance by an Actor" and "Most Outstanding Single Program of the Year." It was also noteworthy for being the first major broadcast to be prerecorded on color videotape, and has recently been restored. The restoration won technical Emmy in 1988 for Ed Reitan, Don Kent, and Dan Einstein, who restored the original videotape, transferring its contents to a modern format, and filling in gaps where the tape had deteriorated with kinescope footage. Astaire personally won the Emmy for Best Single Performance by an Actor but the choice had a controversial backlash because many felt that his dancing in the special was not the type of "acting" the award was designed for. At one point Astaire even offered to return the award, but the Television Academy refused to consider it.

Fred played the role of Julian Osborne in the 1959 movie ''On the Beach'' and was nominated a Golden Globe Best Supporting Actor award for his performance, losing to Stephen Boyd in ''Ben Hur'' . Astaire's last major musical film was ''Finian's Rainbow'' (1968), directed by Francis Ford Coppola. He shed his white tie and tails to play an Irish rogue who believes if he buries a crock of gold in the shadows of Fort Knox it will multiply. His dance partner was Petula Clark, who portrayed his skeptical daughter. He admitted to being as nervous about singing with her as she confessed to being apprehensive about dancing with him. Unfortunately, the film was a box-office failure, though it has gained a strong reputation over the years since its release.

Astaire continued to act into the 1970s, appearing on television as the father of Robert Wagner's character of Alexander Mundy in ''It Takes a Thief'' and in films such as ''The Towering Inferno'' (1974), in which he danced with Jennifer Jones and for which he received his only Academy Award nomination, in the category of Best Supporting Actor. He voiced the mailman narrator in 1970's classic animated film Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town (TV special). He appeared in the first two ''That's Entertainment!'' documentaries in the mid 1970s. In the second, aged seventy-six, he performed a number of song-and-dance routines with Kelly, his last dance performances in a musical film. In the summer of 1975, he made three albums in London, ''Attitude Dancing'', ''They Can't Take These Away From Me'', and ''A Couple of Song and Dance Men'', the last an album of duets with Bing Crosby. In 1976, he played a supporting role as a dog owner in the cult movie ''The Amazing Dobermans'', co-starring Barbara Eden and James Franciscus. Fred Astaire played Dr. Seamus Scully in the French film ''The Purple Taxi'' (1977). In 1978, he co-starred with Helen Hayes in a well-received television film, ''A Family Upside Down,'' in which they play an elderly couple coping with failing health. Astaire won an Emmy Award for his performance. He made a well-publicized guest appearance on the science fiction television series ''Battlestar Galactica'' in 1979, as Chameleon, the possible father of Starbuck, in "The Man with Nine Lives", a role written for him by Donald P. Bellisario. Astaire asked his agent to obtain a role for him on ''Galactica'' because of his grandchildren's interest in the series. His final film role was the 1981 adaptation of Peter Straub's novel ''Ghost Story.'' This horror film was also the last for two of his most prominent castmates, Melvyn Douglas and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.

Working methods and influence on filmed dance[link]

Astaire was a virtuoso dancer, able to convey light-hearted venturesomeness or deep emotion when called for. His technical control and sense of rhythm were astonishing. Long after the photography for the solo dance number "I Want to Be a Dancin' Man" was completed for the 1952 feature "The Belle of New York", it was decided that Astaire's humble costume and the threadbare stage set were inadequate and the entire sequence was re-shot. The 1994 documentary ''That's Entertainment! III'' shows the two performances side-by-side in split screen. Frame for frame, the two performances are absolutely identical, down to the subtlest gesture.

Astaire's execution of a dance routine was prized for its elegance, grace, originality and precision. He drew from a variety of influences, including tap and other black rhythms, classical dance and the elevated style of Vernon and Irene Castle, to create a uniquely recognizable dance style which greatly influenced the American Smooth style of ballroom dance, and set standards against which subsequent film dance musicals would be judged. He termed his eclectic approach his "outlaw style", an unpredictable and instinctive blending of personal artistry. His dances are economical yet endlessly nuanced, as Jerome Robbins stated, "Astaire's dancing looks so simple, so disarming, so easy, yet the understructure, the way he sets the steps on, over or against the music, is so surprising and inventive." Astaire further observes:

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With very few exceptions, Astaire created his routines in collaboration with other choreographers, primarily Hermes Pan. They would often start with a blank slate: }}

Frequently, a dance sequence was built around two or three principal ideas, sometimes inspired by his own steps or by the music itself, suggesting a particular mood or action. Many of his dances were built around a "gimmick", such as dancing on the walls in "Royal Wedding," or dancing with his shadows in ''Swing Time'', that he or his collaborator had thought up earlier and saved for the right situation. They would spend weeks creating all the dance sequences in a secluded rehearsal space before filming would begin, working with a rehearsal pianist (often the composer Hal Borne) who in turn would communicate modifications to the musical orchestrators.

His perfectionism was legendary; however, his relentless insistence on rehearsals and retakes was a burden to some. When time approached for the shooting of a number, Astaire would rehearse for another two weeks, and record the singing and music. With all the preparation completed, the actual shooting would go quickly, conserving costs. Astaire agonized during the entire process, frequently asking colleagues for acceptance for his work, as Vincente Minnelli stated, "He lacks confidence to the most enormous degree of all the people in the world. He will not even go to see his rushes ... He always thinks he is no good." As Astaire himself observed, "I've never yet got anything 100% right. Still it's never as bad as I think it is."

Although he viewed himself as an entertainer first and foremost, his consummate artistry won him the admiration of such twentieth century dance legends as Gene Kelly, George Balanchine, the Nicholas Brothers, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Margot Fonteyn, Bob Fosse, Gregory Hines, Rudolf Nureyev, Michael Jackson and Bill Robinson. Balanchine compared him to Bach, describing him as "the most interesting, the most inventive, the most elegant dancer of our times", while for Baryshnikov he was "a genius ... a classical dancer like I never saw in my life".

Influence on popular song[link]

Extremely modest about his singing abilities (he frequently claimed that he couldn't sing, but the critics rated him as among the finest), Astaire introduced some of the most celebrated songs from the Great American Songbook, in particular, Cole Porter's: "Night and Day" in ''Gay Divorce'' (1932); Irving Berlin's "Isn't This a Lovely Day?", "Cheek to Cheek" and "Top Hat, White Tie and Tails" in ''Top Hat'' (1935), "Let's Face the Music and Dance" in ''Follow the Fleet'' (1936) and "Change Partners" in ''Carefree'' (1938). He first presented Jerome Kern's "The Way You Look Tonight" in ''Swing Time'' (1936); the Gershwins' "They Can't Take That Away From Me" in ''Shall We Dance'' (1937), "A Foggy Day" and "Nice Work if You Can Get it" in ''A Damsel in Distress'' (1937); Johnny Mercer's "One for My Baby" from ''The Sky's the Limit'' (1943) and "Something's Gotta Give" from ''Daddy Long Legs'' (1955); and Harry Warren and Arthur Freed's "This Heart of Mine" from ''Ziegfeld Follies'' (1946).

Astaire also co-introduced a number of song classics via song duets with his partners. For example, with his sister Adele, he co-introduced the Gershwins' "I'll Build a Stairway to Paradise" from ''Stop Flirting'' (1923), "Fascinating Rhythm" in ''Lady, Be Good'' (1924), "Funny Face" in ''Funny Face'' (1927); and, in duets with Ginger Rogers, he presented Irving Berlin's "I'm Putting all My Eggs in One Basket" in ''Follow the Fleet'' (1936), Jerome Kern's "Pick Yourself Up" and "A Fine Romance" in ''Swing Time'' (1936), along with The Gershwins' "Let's Call The Whole Thing Off" from ''Shall We Dance'' (1937). With Judy Garland, he sang Irving Berlin's "A Couple of Swells" from ''Easter Parade'' (1948); and, with Jack Buchanan, Oscar Levant, and Nanette Fabray he delivered Betty Comden and Adolph Green's "That's Entertainment" from ''The Band Wagon'' (1953).

Although he possessed a light voice, he was admired for his lyricism, diction and phrasing — the grace and elegance so prized in his dancing seemed to be reflected in his singing, a capacity for synthesis which led Burton Lane to describe him as "The world's greatest musical performer." Irving Berlin considered Astaire the equal of any male interpreter of his songs — "as good as Jolson, Crosby or Sinatra, not necessarily because of his voice, but for his conception of projecting a song." Jerome Kern considered him the supreme male interpreter of his songs and Cole Porter and Johnny Mercer also admired his unique treatment of their work. And while George Gershwin was somewhat critical of Astaire's singing abilities, he wrote many of his most memorable songs for him. In his heyday, Astaire was referenced in lyrics of songwriters Cole Porter, Lorenz Hart and Eric Maschwitz and continues to inspire modern songwriters.

Astaire was a songwriter of note himself, with "I'm Building Up to an Awful Letdown" (written with lyricist Johnny Mercer) reaching number four in the Hit Parade of 1936. He recorded his own "It's Just Like Taking Candy from a Baby" with Benny Goodman in 1940, and nurtured a lifelong ambition to be a successful popular song composer.

Awards, honors and tributes[link]

1938 — Invited to place his hand and foot prints in cement at Grauman's Chinese Theatre, Hollywood.

1950 — Ginger Rogers presented an honorary Academy Award to Astaire "for his unique artistry and his contributions to the technique of musical pictures".

1950 — Golden Globe for "Best Motion Picture Actor -Music/Comedy" for ''Three Little Words''

1958 — Emmy Award for "Best Single Performance by an Actor" for ''An Evening with Fred Astaire''

1959 — Dance Magazine award

1960 — Nominated for Emmy Award for "Program Achievement" for ''Another Evening with Fred Astaire''

1960 — Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award for "Lifetime Achievement in Motion Pictures"

1961 — Emmy Award for "Program Achievement" in 1961 for ''Astaire Time''

1961 — Voted Champion of Champions — Best Television performer in annual television critics and columnists poll conducted by ''Television Today'' and ''Motion Picture Daily''

1965 — The George Eastman Award from the George Eastman House for "outstanding contributions to motion pictures"

1968 — Nominated for an Emmy Award for ''Musical Variety Program'' for ''The Fred Astaire Show''

1972 — Named Musical Comedy Star of the Century by ''Liberty, "The Nostalgia Magazine"''.

1973 — Subject of a Gala by the Film Society of Lincoln Center

1975 — Academy Award nomination for ''The Towering Inferno''

1975 — Golden Globe for "Best Supporting Actor", BAFTA and David di Donatello awards for ''The Towering Inferno''

1978 — Emmy Award for "Best Actor — Drama or Comedy Special" for ''A Family Upside Down''

1978 — Honored by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences.

1978 — First recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors

1978 — National Artist Award from the American National Theatre Association for "contributing immeasurably to the American Theatre"

1981 — The Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Film Institute

1982 — The Anglo-American Contemporary Dance Foundation announces the Astaire Awards "to honor Fred Astaire and his sister Adele and to reward the achievement of an outstanding dancer or dancers". The awards have since been renamed The Fred and Adele Astaire Awards

1987 — The Capezio Dance Shoe Award (co-awarded with Rudolph Nureyev)

1987 — Inducted into the National Museum of Dance C.V. Whitney Hall of Fame in Saratoga Springs, New York

1989 — Posthumous award of Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award

1989 — Posthumous induction into the Television Hall of Fame

1991 — Posthumous induction into the Ballroom Dancer's Hall of Fame

1999 — Posthumous award of Grammy Hall of Fame Award for 1952 The Astaire Story album

2000 — Ava Astaire McKenzie unveils a plaque in honor of her father, erected by the citizens of Lismore, County Waterford, Ireland

2008 — Conference to honor the life and work of Fred Astaire at Oriel College, University of Oxford, June 21–24.

Built in 1905, the Gottlieb Storz Mansion in Astaire's hometown of Omaha includes the "Adele and Fred Astaire Ballroom" on the top floor, which is the only memorial to their Omaha roots.

Astaire is referenced in the 2003 animated feature, ''The Triplets of Belleville'', in which he is eaten by his shoes after a fast-paced dance act.

Personal life[link]

Politically, Astaire was a conservative and a lifelong Republican Party supporter, though he never made his political views publicly known. Along with Bing Crosby, George Murphy, Ginger Rogers and others he was a charter (founding) member of the Hollywood Republican Committee. He was churchgoing, supportive of American military action and was dismissive of the more open sexiness of movies in the 1970s.

Always immaculately turned out, he and Cary Grant were called "the best-dressed actor[s] in American movies". Astaire remained a male fashion icon even into his later years, eschewing his trademark top hat, white tie and tails (which he never really cared for) in favor of a breezy casual style of tailored sports jackets, colored shirts, cravats and slacks — the latter usually held up by the idiosyncratic use of an old tie in place of a belt.

Astaire was married for the first time in 1933, to the 25-year-old Phyllis Potter (née Phyllis Livingston Baker; born 1908, died September 13, 1954), a Boston-born New York socialite and former wife of Eliphalet Nott Potter III (1906–1981), after pursuing her ardently for roughly two years. Phyllis's death from lung cancer, at the age of 46, ended 21 years of a blissful marriage and left Astaire devastated. Astaire attempted to drop out of the film ''Daddy Long Legs'' (1955), offering to pay the production costs to date, but was persuaded to stay.

In addition to Phyllis Potter's son, Eliphalet IV (known as Peter), the Astaires had two children. Fred, Jr. (born January 1, 1936) appeared with his father in the movie ''Midas Run'', but became a charter pilot and rancher instead of an actor. He married Gale (born 1938) in 1956. Ava Astaire McKenzie (born March 19, 1942; married Richard MacKenzie) remains actively involved in promoting her late father's heritage.

His friend, David Niven, described him as "a pixie — timid, always warm-hearted, with a penchant for schoolboy jokes." Astaire was a lifelong golf and Thoroughbred horse racing enthusiast. In 1946 his horse Triplicate won the prestigious Hollywood Gold Cup and San Juan Capistrano Handicap. He remained physically active well into his eighties. At age seventy-eight, he broke his left wrist while riding his grandson's skateboard.

On June 24, 1980, he was married again, to Robyn Smith (born August 14, 1944), a jockey 45 years his junior, who rode for Alfred G. Vanderbilt II.

Astaire died from pneumonia on June 22, 1987. He was 88 years old. He was interred in the Oakwood Memorial Park Cemetery in Chatsworth, California. One last request of his was to thank his fans for their years of support.

Astaire's life has never been portrayed on film. He always refused permission for such portrayals, saying, "However much they offer me — and offers come in all the time — I shall not sell." Astaire's will included a clause requesting that no such portrayal ever take place; he commented, "It is there because I have no particular desire to have my life misinterpreted, which it would be."

Stage, film and television work[link]

Musical films[link]

''Dancing Lady'' (1933)

''Flying Down to Rio'' (1933)*

''The Gay Divorcee'' (1934)*

''Roberta'' (1935)*

''Top Hat'' (1935)*

''Follow the Fleet'' (1936)*

''Swing Time'' (1936)*

''Shall We Dance'' (1937)*

''A Damsel in Distress'' (1937)

''Carefree'' (1938)*

''The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle'' (1939)*

''Broadway Melody of 1940'' (1940)

''Second Chorus'' (1940)

''You'll Never Get Rich'' (1941)

''Holiday Inn'' (1942)

''You Were Never Lovelier'' (1942)

''The Sky's the Limit'' (1943)

''Yolanda and the Thief'' (1945)

''Ziegfeld Follies'' (1946)

''Blue Skies'' (1946)

''Easter Parade'' (1948)

''The Barkleys of Broadway'' (1949)*

''Three Little Words'' (1950)

''Let's Dance'' (1950)

''Royal Wedding'' (1951)

''The Belle of New York'' (1952)

''The Band Wagon'' (1953)

''Daddy Long Legs'' (1955)

''Funny Face'' (1957)

''Silk Stockings'' (1957)

''The Notorious Landlady'' (1962)

''Finian's Rainbow'' (1968)

''That's Entertainment, Part II'' (1976) (narrator and performer)

Performances with Ginger Rogers

Notes[link]

References[link]

Bibliography[link]

External links[link]

Fred Astaire tribute site

Fred Astaire biography at AlsoDances.Net

Time.com: The Great American Flyer Fred Astaire:1899-1987

Time Magazine archive: Astaire essay by Richard Corliss

Astaire's religious views incl. many extracts from his biographers

Astaire or Kelly: A Generation Apart at Indian Auteur

Ava Astaire discusses her father's legacy. (BBC Television — Realplayer required)

"He's in Heaven ... " — In Memoriam Fred Astaire

Radio Interview — Fred Astaire — 1968

Links to photos of Astaire

"Fred Astaire and the art of fun": an essay on the Oxford Fred Astaire conference from TLS, July 16, 2008.

Fred Astaire in the 1900 US Census, 1910 US Census, and Social Security Death Index.

Category:1899 births Category:1987 deaths Category:American Episcopalians Category:Academy Honorary Award recipients Category:American ballroom dancers Category:20th-century actors Category:Traditional pop music singers Category:American crooners Category:American choreographers Category:American dancers Category:American people of German descent Category:American people of Austrian-Jewish descent Category:American film actors Category:American tap dancers Category:BAFTA winners (people) Category:Best Supporting Actor BAFTA Award winners Category:Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:Best Supporting Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:California Republicans Category:Cecil B. DeMille Award Golden Globe winners Category:Deaths from pneumonia Category:Emmy Award winners Category:Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners Category:Burials at Oakwood Memorial Park Cemetery Category:Kennedy Center honorees Category:National Museum of Dance Hall of Fame inductees Category:Actors from Omaha, Nebraska Category:RCA Victor artists Category:MGM Records artists Category:Vaudeville performers Category:American racehorse owners and breeders Category:Infectious disease deaths in California Category:Film choreographers

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name	Kim Novak
birth name	Marilyn Pauline Novak
birth date	February 13, 1933
birth place	Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
years active	1954–1991
spouse	Richard Johnson (1965–66)Dr. Robert Malloy (1976–present)
residence	Eagle Point, Oregon, U.S. }}

Kim Novak (born Marilyn Pauline Novak, February 13, 1933) is an American film and television actress.

Her first film roles were in ''Pushover'' and ''Phffft!'' (both 1954), and her breakthrough role was in ''Picnic'' (1955). Over the next three years, she appeared in ''The Man with the Golden Arm'' (1955), ''The Eddy Duchin Story'' (1956), ''Pal Joey'' (1957), and ''Bell, Book and Candle'' (1958). She is best known for her role as Judy Barton in the 1958 Alfred Hitchcock film ''Vertigo''. Novak's career went into decline afterwards, and she appeared in films sporadically until 1991. Now retired, she lives with her veterinarian husband on a ranch in Eagle Point, Oregon.

Early life[link]

Novak was born in Chicago, Illinois, to Joseph and Blanche (née Kral) Novak. Both her parents were of Czech descent. Her father worked as a dispatcher on the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railroad and both her parents had been teachers.

While attending David Glasgow Farragut High School, she won a scholarship to the Art Institute of Chicago. After leaving school, she began a career modeling teen fashions for a local department store. She later received a scholarship at a modeling academy and continued to model part-time. She worked as an elevator operator, a sales clerk and a dental assistant.

After a job touring the country as a spokesman for a refrigerator manufacturer, "Miss Deepfreeze", Novak moved to Los Angeles, where she continued to find work as a model.

Career[link]

Early career[link]

Novak began her career in a brief, uncredited role as a model in ''The French Line'' (1954) starring Jane Russell. Eventually, she was seen by a Columbia Pictures talent agent and filmed a screen test. Novak was signed to a six-month contract, and the studio changed her first name to Kim, thus becoming Kim Novak.

Later the same year, Novak had a supporting role as Lona McLane in ''Pushover'' opposite Fred MacMurray and Philip Carey. Filmed in film noir style ''Pushover'' was only a moderate success. She then played the femme fatale role of Janis in ''Phffft!'' opposite Judy Holliday, Jack Lemmon, and Jack Carson. Soon after, she had her first starring role in ''5 Against the House'' (1955), a crime drama.

Mainstream success[link]

After playing Madge Owens in ''Picnic'' (1955) opposite William Holden, Novak won a Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer and for World Film Favorite. She was also nominated for the BAFTA Film Award for Best Foreign Actress. That same year she played Molly in ''The Man with the Golden Arm'' with Frank Sinatra.

In 1956, she played opposite Tyrone Power in ''The Eddy Duchin Story''. In 1957, she worked with Sinatra again in ''Pal Joey'', which also starred Rita Hayworth, and played the title role in ''Jeanne Eagels'' with Jeff Chandler. She was on the cover of the July 29, 1957, issue of ''Time Magazine''.

In 1958, Novak starred in the Alfred Hitchcock-directed thriller ''Vertigo'', playing the roles of a brunette shopgirl, Judy Barton, and a blonde woman named Madeleine Elster. Critic David Shipman thought Novak's performance "little more than competent", while David Thomson described it as "one of the major female performances in the cinema".

That same year, she again starred alongside Stewart in ''Bell, Book and Candle'', a comedy tale of modern-day witchcraft. The following year, she appeared in ''Middle of the Night'', and, in 1960, she co-starred with Kirk Douglas in ''Strangers When We Meet'' also featuring Walter Matthau and Ernie Kovacs.

Career decline[link]

In 1962, Novak produced her own movie in association with Filmways Productions, ''Boys' Night Out'', in which she starred with James Garner and Tony Randall. She was paired with Jack Lemmon for a third and final time that year in a mystery-comedy, ''The Notorious Landlady''.

In 1964, she played the vulgar waitress Mildred Rogers in a remake of W. Somerset Maugham's drama ''Of Human Bondage'' opposite Laurence Harvey, and replaced the late-Marilyn Monroe as barmaid Polly, "The Pistol" in Billy Wilder's ''Kiss Me, Stupid'' with Ray Walston and Dean Martin. After playing the title role in ''The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders'' (1965) with Richard Johnson, Novak took a break from Hollywood acting. She continued to act, although infrequently, taking fewer roles as she began to prefer personal activities over acting

Her comeback came in a dual role as a young actress, Elsa Brinkmann, and an early-day movie goddess who was murdered, Lylah Clare, in producer-director Robert Aldrich's ''The Legend of Lylah Clare'' (1968) with Peter Finch and Ernest Borgnine for MGM. After playing a forger, Sister Lyda Kebanov, in ''The Great Bank Robbery'' (1969) opposite Zero Mostel, Clint Walker, and Claude Akins, she stayed away from the screen for another four years. She then played the role of Auriol Pageant in the horror anthology film ''Tales That Witness Madness'' (1973), which also starred Joan Collins. She starred as veteran showgirl Gloria Joyce in the made-for-TV movie ''The Third Girl From the Left'' (1973), and played Eva in ''Satan's Triangle'' (1975). She was featured in the 1977 western ''The White Buffalo'' with Charles Bronson, and in 1979 she played Helga in ''Just a Gigolo'' co-starring David Bowie.

In 1980, Novak played Lola Brewster in the mystery/thriller ''The Mirror Crack'd'', based on the story by Agatha Christie and co-starring Angela Lansbury, Tony Curtis, Rock Hudson and Elizabeth Taylor. She and Taylor portrayed rival actresses. She made occasional television appearances over the years. Her performances on TV during this time included the TV movie ''Malibu'', in 1983; the pilot episode of ''Alfred Hitchcock Presents'' in 1985; and in 19 episodes of ''Falcon Crest'', playing "Kit Marlowe". She co-starred with Ben Kingsley in the 1990 film ''The Children''.

In 1991, she played the role of a terminally ill writer with a mysterious past in the thriller ''Liebestraum'' opposite Kevin Anderson and Bill Pullman. However, owing to battles with the director over how to play the role, her scenes were cut. Novak later admitted in a 2004 interview that the film was a mistake:

I got so burned out on that picture that I wanted to leave the business, but then if you wait long enough you think, "Oh, I miss certain things." The making of a movie is wonderful. What's difficult is afterward when you have to go around and try to sell it. The actual filming, when you have a good script—which isn't often—nothing beats it.

Retirement[link]

In an interview in 2007, Novak said that she would consider returning to the screen "if the right thing came along."

Novak appeared for a question-and-answer session about her career on July 30, 2010, at the Egyptian Theatre in Los Angeles, where the American Cinematheque hosted a tribute to her coinciding with the August 3 DVD release of "The Kim Novak Collection."

Novak will participate in the Motion Picture Academy Tribute to the “Hitchcock Blondes” (2011).

Honors[link]

For her contribution to motion pictures, Novak was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, at 6332 Hollywood Boulevard.

In 1995, Novak was ranked 92nd by ''Empire Magazine'' on a list of the 100 sexiest stars in film history. In 1955, she won the Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer-Female. In 1957, she won another Golden Globe–for World Favorite female actress. In 1997, Novak won an Honorary Golden Bear at the 47th Berlin International Film Festival.

In 2005, British fashion designer Alexander McQueen named his first It bag the Novak.

Novak is scheduled to participate in a handprint and footprint ceremony at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in April 2012.

Personal life[link]

Novak has been married to veterinarian Dr. Robert Malloy (born 1940) since March 12, 1976. The couple reside on a ranch where they raise horses and llamas. Novak has two stepchildren.

Novak was previously married to English actor Richard Johnson from March 15, 1965, to April 23, 1966. The two have remained friends. Novak dated Sammy Davis, Jr. and Ramfis Trujillo, in the late 1950s and actor Michael Brandon in the 1970s. She was engaged to director Richard Quine in the early 1960s.

On July 24, 2000, her home in Eagle Point, Oregon, was partially destroyed by fire. Novak lost scripts, several paintings, and a computer containing the only draft of her unfinished autobiography. Of the loss Novak said:

I take it personally as a sign that maybe I’m not supposed to write my biography; maybe the past is supposed to stay buried. It made me realize then what was really valuable. That’s the day I wrote a gratitude list. We’re safe and our animals are safe.

In December 2001, her home in Oregon was robbed of more than US$200,000 worth of firearms and tools. Three men were arrested and charged with burglary, theft, and criminal conspiracy.

In 2006, Novak was injured in a horseback riding accident. She suffered a punctured lung, broken ribs, and nerve damage but made a full recovery within a year.

Novak is an artist who paints in watercolor and oil as well as creating sculpture, stained glass design, poetry, and photography.

In October 2010, it was reported that Novak had been diagnosed with breast cancer according to her manager, Sue Cameron. Cameron also noted that Novak is "undergoing treatment" and that "her doctors say she is in fantastic physical shape and should recover very well."

Filmography[link]

''The French Line'' (1954) (uncredited)

''Pushover'' (1954)

''Phffft!'' (1954)

''Son of Sinbad'' (1955) (uncredited)

''5 Against the House'' (1955)

''Picnic'' (1955)

''The Man with the Golden Arm'' (1955)

''The Eddy Duchin Story'' (1956)

''Jeanne Eagels'' (1957)

''Pal Joey'' (1957)

''Vertigo'' (1958)

''Bell, Book and Candle'' (1958)

''Middle of the Night'' (1959)

''Strangers When We Meet'' (1960)

''The Notorious Landlady'' (1962)

''Boys' Night Out'' (1962)

''Of Human Bondage'' (1964)

''Kiss Me, Stupid'' (1964)

''The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders'' (1965)

''The Legend of Lylah Clare'' (1968)

''The Great Bank Robbery'' (1969)

''Tales That Witness Madness'' (1973)

''The Third Girl From the Left'' (1973)

''Satan's Triangle'' (1975)

''The White Buffalo'' (1977)

''Just a Gigolo'' (1979)

''The Mirror Crack'd'' (1980)

''Malibu'' (1983)

''Falcon Crest'' (TV series; cast member from 1986 to 1987)

''I Have Been Very Pleased'' (1987) (short)

''The Children'' (1990)

''Liebestraum'' (1991)

See also [link]

Controversy about Novak's "The Artist" ad in ''Variety''

References[link]

Further reading[link]

External links[link]

Photographs and literature

Category:1933 births Category:Living people Category:American painters Category:American film actors Category:American television actors Category:American people of Czech descent Category:Actors from Chicago, Illinois Category:Actors from Illinois Category:People with cancer Category:People from Eagle Point, Oregon Category:People from Jackson County, Oregon

an:Kim Novak ast:Kim Novak ca:Kim Novak de:Kim Novak es:Kim Novak eo:Kim Novak fr:Kim Novak fy:Kim Novak hr:Kim Novak id:Kim Novak it:Kim Novak la:Kim Novak hu:Kim Novak nl:Kim Novak ja:キム・ノヴァク no:Kim Novak pl:Kim Novak pt:Kim Novak ro:Kim Novak ru:Новак, Ким sl:Kim Novak sr:Ким Новак sh:Kim Novak fi:Kim Novak sv:Kim Novak tl:Kim Novak tr:Kim Novak vi:Kim Novak zh:金·露華

name	Robert Mitchum
birth name
birth date	August 06, 1917
birth place	Bridgeport, Connecticut, U.S.
death date	July 01, 1997
death place	Santa Barbara, California, U.S.
death cause	Lung cancer
occupation	Actor, author, composer, singer
years active	1942–1996
spouse	Dorothy Spence (1940–97) }}

Robert Charles Durman Mitchum (August 6, 1917 – July 1, 1997) was an American film actor, author, composer and singer and is #23 on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest male American screen legends of all time. Mitchum rose to prominence for his starring roles in several major works of the film noir style, and is considered a forerunner of the anti-heroes prevalent in film during the 1950s and 1960s.

Early life and career[link]

Mitchum was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, into a Methodist family. His mother, Ann Harriet (née Gunderson), was a Norwegian immigrant and sea captain's daughter, and his father, James Thomas Mitchum, was a shipyard and railroad worker. A sister, Annette, (known as Julie Mitchum during her acting career) was born in 1914. James Mitchum was crushed to death in a railyard accident in Charleston, South Carolina, in February 1919, when his son was less than 2 years old. After his death, Ann Mitchum was awarded a government pension, and soon realized she was pregnant. She returned to her family in Connecticut, and married a former British Army major who helped her care for the children. In September 1919 a second son, John, was born. When all of the children were old enough to attend school, Ann found employment as a linotype operator for the ''Bridgeport Post''.

Throughout Mitchum's childhood, he was known as a prankster, often involved in fistfights and mischief. When he was 12, his mother sent Mitchum to live with his grandparents in Felton, Delaware, where he was promptly expelled from his middle school for scuffling with a principal. A year later, in 1930, he moved in with his older sister, in New York's Hell's Kitchen. After being expelled from Haaran High School, he left his sister and traveled throughout the country on railroad cars, taking a number of jobs including as a ditch-digger for the Civilian Conservation Corps and as a professional boxer. He experienced numerous adventures during his years as one of the Depression era's "wild boys of the road." At age 14 in Savannah, Georgia, he was arrested for vagrancy and put on a local chain gang. By Mitchum's own account, he escaped and returned to his family in Delaware. It was during this time, while recovering from injuries that nearly lost him a leg, that he met the woman he would marry, a teenaged Dorothy Spence. He soon went back on the road, eventually riding the rails to California.

Mitchum arrived in Long Beach, California, in 1936, staying again with his sister Julie. Soon the rest of the Mitchum family joined them in Long Beach. During this time he worked as a ghostwriter for astrologer Carroll Righter. It was sister Julie who convinced him to join the local theater guild with her. In his years with the Players Guild of Long Beach, he made a living as a stagehand and occasional bit player in company productions. He also wrote several short pieces which were performed by the guild. According to Lee Server's biography (''Robert Mitchum: Baby, I Don't Care''), Mitchum put a talent for poetry to work writing song lyrics and monologues for his sister Julie's nightclub performances. In 1940 he returned East to marry Dorothy, taking her back to California. He remained a footloose character until the birth of their first child, James Mitchum, nicknamed Josh (two more children would follow, Christopher Mitchum and Petrine). Mitchum then got a steady job as a machine operator with the Lockheed Aircraft Corporation.

A nervous breakdown (which resulted in temporary blindness), apparently from job-related stress, led Mitchum to look for work as an actor or extra in movies. An agent he had met got him an interview with the producer of the ''Hopalong Cassidy'' series of B-westerns; he was hired to play the villain in several films in the series during 1942 and 1943. He continued to find further work as an extra and supporting actor in numerous productions for various studios. After impressing director Mervyn LeRoy during the making of ''Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo,'' Mitchum signed a seven-year contract with RKO Radio Pictures. He found himself groomed for B Western stardom in a series of Zane Grey adaptations.

Following the moderately successful western ''Nevada'', Mitchum was lent from RKO to United Artists for the William Wellman-helmed ''The Story of G.I. Joe''. In the film, he portrayed war-weary officer Bill Walker (based on Captain Henry T. Waskow), who remains resolute despite the troubles he faces. The film, which followed the life of an ordinary soldier through the eyes of journalist Ernie Pyle (played by Burgess Meredith), became an instant critical and commercial success. Shortly after making the film, Mitchum himself was drafted into the U.S. Army, serving at Fort MacArthur, California. At the 1946 Academy Awards, ''The Story of G.I. Joe'' was nominated for four Oscars, including Mitchum's only nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He finished the year off with a western (''West of the Pecos'') and a story of returning Marine veterans (''Till the End of Time''), before filming in a genre that came to define Mitchum's career and screen persona: film noir.

Film noir [link]

Mitchum was initially known for his work in film noir. His first foray into the genre was a supporting role in the B-film ''When Strangers Marry'', about newlyweds and a New York City serial killer. ''Undercurrent'', another of Mitchum's early noirs, featured him playing against type as a troubled, sensitive man entangled in the affairs of his brother (Robert Taylor) and his brother's suspicious wife (Katharine Hepburn). The film was director Vincente Minnelli's only film noir.

John Brahm's ''The Locket'' (1946) featured Mitchum as bitter ex-husband to Laraine Day's femme fatale, while Raoul Walsh's ''Pursued'' (1947) combined western and noir styles, with Mitchum's character attempting to recall his past and find those responsible for killing his family. ''Crossfire'' (also 1947) featured Mitchum as a member of a group of soldiers, one of whom killed a Jew. It featured themes of anti-Semitism and the failings of military training. The film, directed by Edward Dmytryk, earned five Academy Award nominations.

Following ''Crossfire,'' Mitchum starred in ''Out of the Past'' (aka ''Build My Gallows High''), directed by Jacques Tourneur and featuring the cinematography of Nicholas Musuraca. Mitchum played Jeff Markham, a small-town gas station owner whose unfinished business with gambler Whit Sterling (Kirk Douglas) and femme fatale Kathie Moffett (Jane Greer), comes back to haunt him. Though ignored by most critics on its release, the film was a modest box office hit at the time and has received a positive reappraisal. Mitchum was photographed again by Musuraca in the Robert Wise psychological western ''Blood on the Moon'' the following year.

On September 1, 1948, after a string of successful films for RKO, Mitchum and actress Lila Leeds were arrested for possession of marijuana. The arrest was the result of a sting operation designed to capture other Hollywood partiers as well, but Mitchum and Leeds did not receive the tip-off. After serving a week at the county jail, (he described the experience to a reporter as being "like Palm Springs, but without the riff-raff") Mitchum spent 43 days (February 16 to March 30) at a Castaic, California, prison farm, with ''Life'' magazine photographers right there taking photos of him mopping up in his prison uniform. The arrest became the inspiration for the exploitation film ''She Shoulda Said No!'' (1949), which starred Leeds. The arrest did little to affect Mitchum's career in the long term, but was seen as an embarrassment by his studio, who ordered Mitchum to clean up his act. The conviction was later overturned by the Los Angeles court and District Attorney's office on January 31, 1951, with the following statement, after it was exposed as a set-up:

Whether despite, or because of, his troubles with the law and his studio, the films released immediately after his arrest were box-office hits. ''Rachel and the Stranger'' (1948) featured Mitchum in a supporting role as a mountain man competing for the hand of Loretta Young, the indentured servant and wife of William Holden, while he appeared in the film adaptation of John Steinbeck's novella ''The Red Pony'' (1949) as a trusted cowhand to a ranching family.

Mitchum returned to true ''film noir'' in ''The Big Steal'' (also 1949), where he again joined Jane Greer in an early Don Siegel film.

Career in the 1950s and 1960s [link]

In ''Where Danger Lives'' (1950) he played a doctor who comes between a mentally unbalanced Faith Domergue and cuckolded Claude Rains. ''The Racket'' was a noir remake of the early crime drama of the same name and featured Mitchum as a police captain fighting corruption in his precinct. The Josef von Sternberg film ''Macao'' (1952) saw Mitchum a victim of mistaken identity at an exotic resort casino, playing opposite Jane Russell. Otto Preminger's ''Angel Face'' was the first of three collaborations between Mitchum and British stage actress Jean Simmons. In the film, Simmons plays an insane heiress who plans to use young ambulance driver Mitchum to kill for her.

Mitchum's cynical, mischievous attitude through his career had led him to shrug off fame as a fluke. His expulsion from ''Blood Alley'' (1955) is frequently attributed to his pranks, especially one in which he reportedly threw the film's transportation manager into San Francisco Bay. According to Sam O'Steen's memoir, ''Cut to the Chase'', Mitchum showed up on set after a night of drinking and tore apart a studio office when they didn't have a car ready for him. Mitchum walked off the set of the third day of filming ''Blood Alley'', claiming he could not work with the director. Because he was showing up late and behaving erratically, producer John Wayne, after failing to obtain Humphrey Bogart as a replacement, took over the role himself.

Following a series of conventional westerns and films noirs, including the Marilyn Monroe vehicle ''River of No Return'' (1954), he appeared in Charles Laughton's only film as director, ''The Night of the Hunter'' (1955). Based on a novel by Davis Grubb, the film noir thriller starred Mitchum as a monstrous criminal posing as a preacher to find money hidden by his cellmate in the cellmate's home. His performance as Reverend Harry Powell is considered by many to be one of the best of his career. Stanley Kramer's melodrama ''Not as a Stranger'' though, also released in 1955, was a box office hit for Mitchum. The film starred Mitchum against type, as an idealistic young doctor, who marries an older nurse (Olivia de Havilland), only to question his morality many years later. However, the film was not well received, with most critics pointing out that Mitchum, Frank Sinatra and Lee Marvin were all too old for their characters. Olivia de Havilland received top billing over Mitchum and Sinatra.

Following a succession of average westerns and the poorly received ''Foreign Intrigue'' (1956), Mitchum starred in the first of three films with British actress Deborah Kerr. The John Huston war drama ''Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison'' starred Mitchum as a marine corporal shipwrecked on a Pacific Island with a nun, Sister Angela (Deborah Kerr), being his sole companion. In this character study they struggle to resist the elements and the invading Japanese army. The film was nominated for two Academy Awards, including Best Actress and Best Adapted Screenplay. For his role, Mitchum was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actor.

''Thunder Road'' (1958) was loosely based on an incident in which a driver transporting moonshine was said to have crashed to his death on Kingston Pike in Knoxville, Tennessee somewhere between Bearden Hill and Morrell Road. According to Metro Pulse writer Jack Renfro, the incident occurred in 1952 and may have been witnessed by James Agee, who passed the story on to Mitchum–who not only starred in the movie, but also produced the film, co-wrote the screenplay, and is rumored to have directed much of the film himself. Mitchum also co-wrote (with Don Raye) the theme song, "The Ballad of Thunder Road."

Mitchum and Kerr reunited for the Fred Zinnemann film, ''The Sundowners'' (1960), where they played husband and wife struggling in Depression-era Australia. Opposite Mitchum, Kerr was nominated for yet another Academy Award for Best Actress, while the film was nominated for a total of five Oscars. Robert Mitchum was awarded that year's National Board of Review award for Best Actor for his performance. The award also recognized his superior performance in the Vincente Minnelli western drama ''Home from the Hill'' (also 1960). He was teamed with both Kerr and previous leading lady Jean Simmons as well as Cary Grant for the extremely offbeat Stanley Donen ensemble comedy ''The Grass Is Greener'' the same year.

Mitchum's performance as the menacing southern rapist Max Cady in ''Cape Fear'' (1962) brought him even more attention and furthered his renown as playing cool, predatory characters. The 1960s were marked by a number of lesser films and missed opportunities. Among the films Mitchum passed on during the decade was John Huston's ''The Misfits'', the last film of its stars Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe, the Academy Award–winning ''Patton'', and ''Dirty Harry''. The most notable of his films in the decade included the war epics ''The Longest Day'' (1962) and ''Anzio'' (1968), the Shirley MacLaine comedy-musical ''What a Way to Go!'' (1964), and the Howard Hawks western ''El Dorado'' (1966), a remake of ''Rio Bravo'' (1959), in which Mitchum took over Dean Martin's role of the drunk who comes to the aid of John Wayne.

Music career [link]

One of the lesser known aspects of Mitchum's career was his forays into music, both as singer and composer

Mitchum's voice was often used instead of that of a professional singer when his characters sang in his films. Notable productions featuring Mitchum's own singing voice included ''Rachel and the Stranger'', ''River of No Return'' and ''The Night of the Hunter''. After hearing traditional calypso music and meeting artists such as Mighty Sparrow and Lord Invader while filming ''Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison'' in the Caribbean island of Tobago, he recorded ''Calypso — is like so...'' in March 1957. On the album, released through Capitol Records, he emulated the calypso sound and style, even adopting the style's unique pronunciations and slang. A year later he recorded a song he had written for the film ''Thunder Road'', titled "The Ballad of Thunder Road". The country-styled song became a modest hit for Mitchum, reaching #69 on the Billboard Pop Singles Chart. The song was included as a bonus track on a successful reissue of ''Calypso...'' and helped market the film to a wider audience.

Though Mitchum continued to use his singing voice in his film work, he waited until 1967 to record his follow-up record, ''That Man, Robert Mitchum, Sings''. The album, released by Nashville-based Monument Records, took him further into country music, and featured songs similar to ''The Ballad of Thunder Road''. "Little Old Wine Drinker Me," the first single, was a top ten hit at country radio, reaching #9 there, and crossed over onto mainstream radio, where it peaked at #96. Its follow-up, "You Deserve Each Other," also charted on the Billboard Country Singles Chart.

Mitchum also co-wrote and composed the music for an oratorio which was produced by Orson Welles at the Hollywood Bowl.

Albums[link]

! Year	! Album	! width="45"	! Label
1957	''Calypso — is like so...''		Capitol
1967	''That Man Robert Mitchum...Sings''		Monument

Singles[link]

Year	Single	Chart Positions		Album
		! width="50"	! width="50"
1958	"The Ballad of Thunder Road"
1962	"The Ballad of Thunder Road" (re-release)
	"Little Old Wine Drinker Me"
"You Deserve Each Other"

Later career [link]

Mitchum made a departure from his typical screen persona with the 1970 David Lean film ''Ryan's Daughter'', in which he starred as Charles Shaughnessy, a mild-mannered schoolmaster in World War I era Ireland. Though the film was nominated for four Academy Awards (winning two) and Mitchum was much publicized as a contender for a Best Actor nomination, he was not nominated. George C. Scott won the award for his performance in ''Patton,'' a project which Mitchum had rejected for ''Ryan's Daughter.''

The 1970s featured Mitchum in a number of well-received crime dramas. ''The Friends of Eddie Coyle'' (1973) saw the actor playing an aging Boston hoodlum caught between the Feds and his criminal friends. Sydney Pollack's ''The Yakuza'' (1975) transplanted the typical film noir story arc to the Japanese underworld. He also appeared in 1976's ''Midway'' about an epic 1942 World War II battle. Mitchum's stint as an aging Philip Marlowe in the Raymond Chandler adaptation ''Farewell, My Lovely'' (1975) was sufficiently well-received by audiences and critics for him to reprise the role in 1978's ''The Big Sleep''.

In 1982, Mitchum went on location to Scranton, Pennsylvania, to play Coach Delaney in the film adaptation of playwright/actor Jason Miller's 1973 Pulitzer Prize winning play ''That Championship Season''. He played a hard-boiled, bigoted coach whose former star players continue to swear allegiance to him, with one exception.

Mitchum expanded into the medium of television with the 1983 miniseries ''The Winds of War''. The big-budget Herman Wouk story aired on ABC and starred Mitchum as naval officer "Pug" Henry, and examined the events leading up to America's involvement in World War II. He followed it in 1988 with ''War and Remembrance'', which followed America through the war, and returned to the big screen for a memorable supporting role in Bill Murray's ''Scrooged''.

In 1987, Mitchum was the guest host on ''Saturday Night Live'' where he played private eye Philip Marlowe for the last time in the parody sketch, "Death Be Not Deadly". The show also ran a short comedy film he made (written and directed by his daughter, Trina) called ''Out of Gas''. This was a mock sequel to his 1947 classic ''Out of the Past''. Jane Greer reprised her role from the original film.

In 1991, he won a lifetime achievement award from the National Board of Review of Motion Pictures and the Cecil B. DeMille Award from the Golden Globe Awards in 1992.

Though Mitchum continued to appear in films throughout the 1990s, such as ''Tombstone'', Jim Jarmusch's ''Dead Man,'' and appeared in contrast to his role as the antagonist in the original, a protagonist police detective in Martin Scorsese's remake of ''Cape Fear'', the actor gradually slowed his workload. His last film appearance was in the television biopic, ''James Dean: Race with Destiny.'' His last starring role was in the 1995 Norwegian movie ''Pakten''.

Death [link]

Mitchum died on July 1, 1997, in Santa Barbara, California, due to complications of lung cancer and emphysema. His body was cremated and his ashes scattered at sea. He was survived by his wife of 57 years, Dorothy Mitchum, and actor sons, James Mitchum, Christopher Mitchum, and daughter Petrina (Trina) Mitchum. His grandchildren, Bentley Mitchum and Carrie Mitchum, are also actors, as was his younger brother John Mitchum, who died in 2001. His other grandson, Kian Mitchum, is a successful model.

Legacy [link]

Mitchum is regarded by critics as one of the finest actors of the Golden Age of Hollywood. Roger Ebert called him 'the soul of film noir'. Mitchum himself, however, was self-effacing; in an interview with Barry Norman for the BBC about his contribution to cinema, Mitchum stopped Norman in mid flow and in his typical phlegmatic style said, "Look, I have two kinds of acting. One on a horse and one off a horse. That's it." He had also succeeded in annoying some of his fellow actors by voicing his puzzlement at those who viewed the profession as challenging and hard work. He is quoted as having said in a BBC interview with Barry Norman that acting was actually very simple and that his job was to "show up on time, know his lines, hit his marks, and go home".

Interviewer Larry King has said on a number of occasions that Mitchum's interview was his most challenging. Mitchum, a man of few words, tended to answer simply "Yes" or "No" to many of King's questions.

He is #23 on AFI's 100 Years...100 Stars. Along with his performance as the menacing rapist Max Cady, is #28 on AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains, as a villain.

He was the voice of the famous American Beef Council commercials that touted "''Beef . . . it's what's for dinner''", from the early 1980s until his death. There is a "Mitchum's Steakhouse" in Trappe, Maryland, where Mitchum and his family lived from 1959 to 1965.

Filmography [link]

Features [link]

''Hoppy Serves a Writ'' (1943)

''The Human Comedy'' (1943)

''Aerial Gunner'' (1943)

''Border Patrol'' (1943)

''Follow the Band'' (1943)

''Leather Burners'' (1943)

''Colt Comrades'' (1943)

''We've Never Been Licked'' (1943)

''Lone Star Trail'' (1943)

''Beyond the Last Frontier'' (1943)

''Corvette K-225'' (1943)

''Bar 20'' (1943)

''Doughboys in Ireland'' (1943)

''False Colors'' (1943)

''Minesweeper'' (1943)

''The Dancing Masters'' (1943)

''Cry 'Havoc''' (1943) (uncredited)

''Riders of the Deadline'' (1943)

''Gung Ho!'' (1943)

''Johnny Doesn't Live Here Any More'' (1944)

''Mr. Winkle Goes to War'' (1944)

''When Strangers Marry'' (1944)

''Girl Rush'' (1944)

''Thirty Seconds over Tokyo'' (1944)

''Nevada'' (1944)

''The Story of G.I. Joe'' (1945)

''West of the Pecos'' (1945)

''Till the End of Time'' (1946)

''Undercurrent'' (1946)

''The Locket'' (1946)

''Pursued'' (1947)

''Crossfire'' (1947)

''Desire Me'' (1947)

''Out of the Past'' (1947)

''Rachel and the Stranger'' (1948)

''Blood on the Moon'' (1948)

''The Red Pony'' (1949)

''The Big Steal'' (1949)

''Holiday Affair'' (1949)

''Where Danger Lives'' (1950)

''My Forbidden Past'' (1951)

''His Kind of Woman'' (1951)

''The Racket'' (1951)

''Macao'' (1952)

''One Minute to Zero'' (1952)

''The Lusty Men'' (1952)

''Angel Face'' (1952)

''White Witch Doctor'' (1953)

''Second Chance'' (1953)

''She Couldn't Say No'' (1954)

''River of No Return'' (1954)

''A Backhand for Sally'' (1954)

''Track of the Cat'' (1954)

''Not as a Stranger'' (1955)

''The Night of the Hunter'' (1955)

''Man with the Gun'' (1955)

''Foreign Intrigue'' (1956)

''Bandido'' (1956)

''Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison'' (1957)

''Fire Down Below'' (1957)

''The Enemy Below'' (1957)

''Thunder Road'' (1958)

''The Hunters'' (1958)

''The Angry Hills'' (1959)

''The Wonderful Country'' (1959)

''Home from the Hill'' (1960)

''A Terrible Beauty'' (1960)

''The Sundowners'' (1960)

''The Grass Is Greener'' (1960)

''The Last Time I Saw Archie'' (1961)

''Cape Fear'' (1962)

''The Longest Day'' (1962)

''Two for the Seesaw'' (1962)

''The List of Adrian Messenger'' (1963)

''Rampage'' (1963)

''Man in the Middle'' (1963)

''What a Way to Go!'' (1964)

''Mister Moses'' (1965)

''El Dorado'' (1966)

''The Way West'' (1967)

''Villa Rides'' (1968)

''Anzio'' (1968)

''5 Card Stud'' (1968)

''Secret Ceremony'' (1968)

''Young Billy Young'' (1969)

''The Good Guys and the Bad Guys'' (1969)

''Ryan's Daughter'' (1970)

''Going Home'' (1971)

''The Wrath of God'' (1972)

''The Friends of Eddie Coyle'' (1973)

''The Yakuza'' (1974)

''Farewell, My Lovely'' (1975)

''Midway'' (1976)

''The Last Tycoon'' (1976)

''The Amsterdam Kill'' (1977)

''The Big Sleep'' (1978)

''Matilda'' (1978)

''Breakthrough'' (1979)

''Agency'' (1980)

''Nightkill'' (1980)

''That Championship Season'' (1982)

''One Shoe Makes It Murder'' (1982) (TV)

''The Ambassador'' (1984)

''A Killer In the Family'' (1983) (TV)

''The Winds of War'' TV mini-series (1983)

''Maria's Lovers'' (1984)

''Reunion at Fairborough'' (1985)

''Remembering Marilyn'' (1987) (documentary)

''War and Remembrance'' TV mini-series (1988)

''Mr. North'' (1988)

''Scrooged'' (1988)

''Brotherhood of the Rose'' (1989) TV movie

''John Huston: The Man, the Movies, the Maverick'' (1989) (documentary)

''Midnight Ride'' (1990)

''Supposedly Dangerous'' (1990)

''Cape Fear (1991)

''The Seven Deadly Sins'' (1992)

''Woman of Desire'' (1993)

''Tombstone'' (1993) (narrator)

''Backfire!'' (1995)

''Dead Man'' (1995)

''Waiting for Sunset'' (1995)

''Wild Bill: Hollywood Maverick'' (1996) (documentary)

Short subjects [link]

''The Magic of Make-up'' (1942)

''Screen Snapshots: Hollywood Goes to Bat'' (1950)

''Waiting for the Wind'' (1990)

Discography [link]

Albums [link]

''Calypso — is like so...'' (1957, Capitol)

''That Man, Robert Mitchum, Sings'' (1967, Monument) Country: #35

Singles [link]

"The Ballad of Thunder Road" (1958, Capitol) Pop: #62

"Little Old Wine Drinker Me" (1967, Monument) Country: #9 Pop: #96

"You Deserve Each Other" (1967, Monument) Country: #55

Further reading [link]

Mike Tomkies ''The Robert Mitchum Story, "It Sure Beats Working"'' Ballantine Books, 1972, ISBN 0-345-23484-7

John Mitchum ''Them Ornery Mitchum Boys, The Adventures of Robert and John Mitchum'', Creatures at Large, 1989, ISBN 0-940064-07-3

TCM Film Guide, "Leading Men: The 50 Most Unforgettable Actors of the Studio Era", Chronicle Books, San Francisco, California, 2006, ISBN 0-8118-5467-1

References [link]

External links [link]

Profile @ Turner Classic Movies

Photographs and literature

Category:1917 births Category:1997 deaths Category:American Methodists Category:Actors from Connecticut Category:American film actors Category:Cancer deaths in California Category:Cecil B. DeMille Award Golden Globe winners Category:Civilian Conservation Corps people Category:Deaths from emphysema Category:Deaths from lung cancer Category:American people of Norwegian descent Category:People from Bridgeport, Connecticut Category:Western (genre) film actors

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name	Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.
birth name	Douglas Elton Fairbanks, Jr.
birth date	December 09, 1909
birth place	New York City, New York
death date	May 07, 2000
death place	New York City, New York
death cause	heart attack
occupation	Actor, Naval officer
years active	1916-1997
spouse	Joan Crawford (m.1929-1933; divorced) Mary Lee Eppling (m.1939-1988) Vera Shelton (m.1991-2000; his death)
children	Daphne FairbanksVictoria FairbanksMelissa Fairbanks
parents	Douglas Fairbanks,Anna Beth Sully

}}

Douglas Elton Fairbanks, Jr. KBE (December 9, 1909 – May 7, 2000) was an American actor and a highly decorated naval officer of World War II.

Early life[link]

Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. was born in New York City as the only child of actor Douglas Fairbanks, and his first wife, Anna Beth Sully. His parents divorced when he was nine years old, and although both remarried, they had no more children. He lived with his mother in New York, California, Paris and London.

Hollywood[link]

Fairbanks' father was one of cinema's first icons, noted for such swashbuckling adventure films as ''The Mark of Zorro'', ''Robin Hood'' and ''The Thief of Bagdad''. Largely on the basis of his father's name, Fairbanks, Jr. was given a contract with Paramount Pictures at age 14. After making some undistinguished films, he took to the stage, where he impressed his father, his stepmother Mary Pickford, and Charlie Chaplin, who encouraged him to continue with acting.

He began his career during the silent film era. He initially played mainly supporting roles in a range of films featuring many of the leading female players of the day: Belle Bennett in ''Stella Dallas'' (1925), Esther Ralston in ''An American Venus'' (1926) and Pauline Starke in ''Women Love Diamonds'' (1927). In the last years of the silent period he was upped to star billing opposite Loretta Young in several pre-Code films and Joan Crawford in ''Our Modern Maidens'' (1929). He supported John Gilbert and Greta Garbo in ''Woman of Affairs'' (1929). Progressing to sound, he played opposite Katharine Hepburn in her Oscar-winning role in the film ''Morning Glory'' (1933).

With ''Outward Bound'' (1930), ''The Dawn Patrol'' (1930), ''Little Caesar'' (1931), ''Prisoner of Zenda''(1937), and ''Gunga Din'' (1939), his movies began to have more commercial success.

Marriages[link]

His first notable relationship was with the actress Joan Crawford, whom he began to date seriously during the filming of ''Our Modern Maidens''. On June 3, 1929, at St Malachy in New York City, Crawford and Fairbanks married. Fairbanks was only 19 and Crawford was four years older.

They went on a delayed honeymoon to England, where he was entertained by Noël Coward, Gertrude Lawrence, Bea Lillie, and Prince George, Duke of Kent. He became active in both society and politics, but Crawford was far more interested in her career and had an affair with Clark Gable. The couple divorced in 1933.

Despite their divorce, Fairbanks was quick to defend Crawford when her adopted daughter Christina Crawford, published ''Mommie Dearest'', a scathing biography of Crawford's personal life. He firmly stated, "The Joan Crawford that I've heard about in ''Mommie Dearest'' is not the Joan Crawford I knew back then." A December 2011 eBay auction of a 1977 letter sent by Fairbanks Jr. to Joan Crawford illustrates the fact that the two celebrity ex-spouses remained on friendly terms for the duration of their lives; In the auctioned letter, Fairbanks Jr. mentions that they hadn't met for a drink in over a year.

On April 22, 1939, Fairbanks married Mary Lee Hartford (née Mary Lee Epling), a former wife of Huntington Hartford, the A&P; Supermarket heir. They remained together until her death in 1988, and had three daughters: Daphne, Victoria, and Melissa.

On May 30, 1991, Fairbanks wed Vera Lee Shelton, a merchandiser for QVC Network Inc.

World War II[link]

In 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed him a special envoy to South America.

Although celebrated as an actor, Fairbanks was commissioned a reserve officer in the United States Navy at the onset of World War II and assigned to Lord Louis Mountbatten's Commando staff in the United Kingdom.

Having witnessed (and participated in) British training and cross-channel harassment operations emphasizing the military art of deception, Fairbanks attained a depth of understanding and appreciation of military deception then unheard of in the United States Navy. Lieutenant Fairbanks was subsequently transferred to Virginia Beach where he came under the command of Admiral H. Kent Hewitt, who was preparing U.S. Naval forces for the invasion of North Africa.

Fairbanks convinced Hewitt of the advantages of such a unit, then repeated the proposal at Hewett's behest to Admiral Ernest King, Chief of Naval Operations. King thereupon issued a secret letter on March 5, 1943 charging the Vice Chief of Naval Operations with the recruitment of 180 officers and 300 enlisted men for the Beach Jumper program.

The Beach Jumpers' mission would simulate amphibious landings with a very limited force. Operating dozens of kilometers from the actual landing beaches and utilizing their deception equipment, the Beach Jumpers would lure the enemy into believing that theirs was the principal landing.

United States Navy Beach Jumpers saw their initial action in Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily. Throughout the remainder of the war, the Beach Jumpers conducted their hazardous, shallow-water operations throughout the Mediterranean.

For his planning the diversion-deception operations and his part in the amphibious assault on Southern France, Lieutenant Commander Fairbanks was awarded the United States Navy's Legion of Merit with bronze V (for valor), the Italian War Cross for Military Valor, the French Légion d'honneur and the Croix de guerre with Palm, and the British Distinguished Service Cross. Fairbanks was also awarded the Silver Star for valor displayed while serving on PT boats and the National Order of the Southern Cross, conferred by the Brazilian government. Among his other exploits was the sinking of the light cruiser ''Capriole'' while in command of a mixed division of American PT Boats and British MGBs.

He was made an Honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE) in 1949. Fairbanks stayed in the Naval Reserve after the war and ultimately retired a captain in 1954.

Post-war years[link]

Fairbanks returned to Hollywood at the conclusion of World War II, but as a confirmed Anglophile, he spent a considerable amount of his time in the United Kingdom, where he was well known in the highest social circles. Between 1954 and 1956 he also made a number of half-hour programs at one of the smaller Elstree film studios as part of a syndicated anthology series for television called ''Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Presents''. In the middle 1950s, Fairbanks was a guest star on NBC's ''The Martha Raye Show''. On February 7, 1957, he appeared on NBC's ''The Ford Show'' starring Tennessee Ernie Ford. On stage, Fairbanks toured in ''My Fair Lady'' in 1968, and in ''The Pleasure of His Company'' several times, including tours in the U.S. in 1970–72 and the 1977 Australian production with Stanley Holloway.

The College of Arms in London granted Fairbanks a coat of arms symbolising the U.S. and Britain united across the blue Atlantic Ocean by a silken knot of friendship.

In 1982, Fairbanks was awarded the German Federal Cross of Merit for his contribution to the relief of the needy in occupied Germany.

It has been claimed that Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. was one of the naked men in the incriminating photos used as evidence in the divorce trial of Margaret Campbell, Duchess of Argyll in 1963.

Fairbanks was a friend of Laurence Olivier and was among the contributors to a documentary by ''The South Bank Show'' called ''Laurence Olivier: A Life''. He was also a close friend of Sir Rex Harrison and was a presenter at Harrison's New York City memorial service.

He wrote his autobiography, ''The Salad Days'', in 1988.

Death and legacy[link]

Fairbanks died of a heart attack in New York at the age of 90 and is interred at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood, California, in the same crypt as his father.

Fairbanks has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for motion pictures at 6318 Hollywood Boulevard and one for television at 6665 Hollywood Boulevard. In 1969 he was inducted into the Hall of Fame of the International Best Dressed List.

Estate[link]

Fairbanks' estate was auctioned September 13, 2011 by Doyle New York, surpassing estimated proceeds by netting over a half million.

Partial filmography[link]

''Stephen Steps Out'' (1923)

''The Air Mail'' (1925)

''Wild Horse Mesa'' (1925)

''Stella Dallas'' (1925)

''The American Venus'' (1926)

''Padlocked'' (1926)

''Broken Hearts of Hollywood'' (1926)

''Man Bait'' (1927)

''Women Love Diamonds'' (1927)

''Is Zat So?'' (1927)

''A Texas Steer'' (1927)

''Dead Man's Curve'' (1928)

''Modern Mothers'' (1928)

''The Toilers'' (1928)

''The Power of the Press'' (1928)

''The Barker'' (1928)

''A Woman of Affairs'' (1928)

''Hollywood Snapshots #11'' (1929) (short subject)

''The Forward Pass'' (1929)

''The Jazz Age'' (1929)

''Our Modern Maidens'' (1929)

''Loose Ankles'' (1930)

''Flight Commander (originally 'Dawn Patrol')'' (1930)

''Little Caesar'' (1931)

''I Like Your Nerve'' (1931)

''Union Depot'' (1932)

''Scarlet Dawn'' (1932)

''Parachute Jumper'' (1933)

''The Life of Jimmy Dolan'' (1933)

''Morning Glory'' (1933)

''Captured!'' (1933)

''Catherine the Great'' (1934)

''Man of the Moment'' (1935)

''The Amateur Gentleman'' (1936)

''The Prisoner of Zenda'' (1937)

''Joy of Living'' (1938)

''The Rage of Paris'' (1938)

''Having Wonderful Time'' (1938)

''The Young in Heart'' (1938)

''Gunga Din'' (1939)

''Rulers of the Sea'' (1939)

''Green Hell'' (1940)

''Angels Over Broadway'' (1940)

''The Corsican Brothers'' (1941)

''Sinbad the Sailor'' (1947)

''The Exile'' (1947)

''That Lady in Ermine'' (1948)

"The Fighting O'Flynn" (1949)

''State Secret'' (1950)

''Mister Drake's Duck'' (1951)

''The Triangle'' (1953)

''The Genie'' (1953)

''The Hostage Tower'' (1980)

''Ghost Story'' (1981)

References[link]

External links[link]

Douglas Fairbanks Jr – Daily Telegraph obituary

Photographs of Douglas Fairbanks jr.

Navy Department History entry

Category:1909 births Category:2000 deaths Category:20th-century actors Category:Actors awarded British knighthoods Category:American child actors Category:American film actors Category:American military personnel of World War II Category:American silent film actors Category:Burials at Hollywood Forever Cemetery Category:Deaths from myocardial infarction Category:Heraldists Category:Honorary Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire Category:Légion d'honneur recipients Category:Recipients of the Croce di Guerra Category:Grand Crosses with Star and Sash of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Category:Actors from New York City Category:Recipients of the Distinguished Service Cross (United Kingdom) Category:Recipients of the Croix de Guerre (France) Category:Recipients of the Legion of Merit Category:Recipients of the Silver Star Category:Collegiate School (New York) alumni Category:United States Navy officers Category:American expatriates in the United Kingdom

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