John Richard Basehart (August 31, 1914 – September 17, 1984) was an American actor. He starred in the 1960s television science fiction drama Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, in the role of Admiral Harriman Nelson.

Career[link]

One of his most notable film roles was the acrobat known as "the Fool" in the acclaimed Italian film La Strada, directed by Federico Fellini. He also appeared as the killer in the film noir classic He Walked by Night (1948), as a psychotic member of the Hatfield clan in Roseanna McCoy (1949), as Ishmael in Moby Dick (1956), and in the drama Decision Before Dawn (1951). He was married to Italian Academy Award-nominated actress Valentina Cortese, with whom he had one son, the actor Jackie Basehart, before their divorce in 1960. Cortese and Basehart also costarred in Robert Wise's The House on Telegraph Hill (1951).

From 1964-68, Basehart played the lead role, Admiral Harriman Nelson, on Irwin Allen's first foray into science-fiction television, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. Allen would go on to produce a number of sci-fi series in the 1960s and the highly successful feature films The Poseidon Adventure (1972) and The Towering Inferno (1974), earning him the moniker "The Master of Disaster." Although Basehart started his career as a film actor, he became best known for his role on Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.

Basehart was also noted for his deep, distinctive voice and was prolific as a narrator of many television and movie projects ranging from features to documentaries. In 1980, Basehart narrated the mini-series written by Peter Arnett called Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day War that covered Vietnam and its battles from the Japanese surrender on September 2, 1945 to the final American embassy evacuation on April 30, 1975. He appeared in the pilot episode of the television series Knight Rider as billionaire Wilton Knight. He is the narrator at the beginning of the show's credits.

He starred as Hitler in the 1962 film of that name. In 1971, Basehart played "Captain Sligo", a comical Irishman with a pet buffalo who negotiates a flawed but legal cattle purchase and unconventionally courts a widow with two children, played by Salome Jens, in CBS's western series, Gunsmoke, with James Arness. Basehart appeared in an episode of The Twilight Zone, Hawaii Five-O, and as Hannibal Applewood, an abusive schoolteacher in Little House on the Prairie in 1976.

In 1972, he appeared in the Columbo episode Dagger of the Mind in which he and Honor Blackman played a husband-and-wife theatrical team who were loose parodies of Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh. In the feature realm, he played a supporting role as a doctor in Rage (1972), a theatrical feature starring and directed by George C. Scott. He made a few TV movies including Sole Survivor (1970) and The Birdmen (1971). Both were based on true stories during World War II.

Personal life[link]

Richard Basehart's grave

He was married three times. After the death of his first wife Stephanie Klein, he wed Italian actress Valentina Cortese (whose name was spelled Cortesa in American films). After their divorce, Basehart married Diana Lotery, with whom he founded the charity Actors and Others for Animals.

Basehart died at age 70 following a series of strokes. One month before his death, Basehart was an announcer for the closing ceremonies of the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. He is buried at Westwood Village Memorial Park cemetery in Los Angeles.

Legacy in popular culture[link]

He had a notable fan in the character of Gypsy from the cult cable television program Mystery Science Theater 3000. Basehart is mentioned in the song "The Radio Is Broken" on the 1983 Frank Zappa album The Man from Utopia.

Partial filmography[link]

External links[link]

Biography portal

• Richard Basehart at the Internet Movie Database
• Richard Basehart at AllRovi
• Richard Basehart at the Internet Broadway Database
• Official site, with biography and filmography.
• "The Birdmen" movie fan website, Information about the movie.

Richard Widmark
Widmark in the trailer for Panic in the Streets (1950)
Born	Richard Weedt Widmark (1914-12-26)December 26, 1914 Sunrise Township, Minnesota, U.S.
Died	March 24, 2008(2008-03-24) (aged 93) Roxbury, Connecticut, U.S.
Years active	1938–2001
Spouse	Jean Hazlewood (m. 1942–1997) «start: (1942)–end+1: (1998)»"Marriage: Jean Hazlewood to Richard Widmark" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Richard_Widmark)(her death) Susan Blanchard (m. 1999–2008) «start: (1999)–end+1: (2009)»"Marriage: Susan Blanchard to Richard Widmark" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Richard_Widmark)(his death)

Richard Weedt Widmark (December 26, 1914 – March 24, 2008) was an American film, stage and television actor.

He was nominated for an Academy Award for his role as the villainous Tommy Udo in his debut film, Kiss of Death, for which he also won the Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer. Early in his career Widmark specialized in similar villainous or anti-hero roles in films noir, but he later branched out into more heroic leading and support roles in westerns, mainstream dramas and horror films, among others.

For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Widmark has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6800 Hollywood Boulevard. In 2002, he was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

Early life[link]

Widmark was born in Sunrise Township, Minnesota,^[1] the son of Ethel Mae (née Barr) and Carl H. Widmark.^[2] His father was of Swedish descent and his mother of English and Scottish ancestry.^[3] Widmark grew up in Princeton, Illinois, and also lived in Henry, Illinois for a short time, moving frequently because of his father's work as a traveling salesman.^[4] He attended Lake Forest College, where he studied acting and also taught acting after he graduated.

Radio[link]

Widmark made his debut as a radio actor in 1938 on Aunt Jenny's Real Life Stories. In 1941 and 1942, he was heard daily on the Mutual Broadcasting System in the title role of the daytime serial Front Page Farrell, introduced each afternoon as "the exciting, unforgettable radio drama... the story of a crack newspaperman and his wife, the story of David and Sally Farrell." Farrell was a top reporter for the Brooklyn Eagle. When the series moved to NBC, Widmark turned the role over to Carleton G. Young and Staats Cotsworth.

During the 1940s, Widmark was also heard on such network radio programs as Gang Busters, Inner Sanctum Mysteries, Joyce Jordan, M.D., Molle Mystery Theater, Suspense and Ethel and Albert. In 1952 he portrayed Cincinnatus Shryock in an episode of "Cavalcade of America" entitled "Adventure on the Kentucky". He returned to radio drama decades later, performing on CBS Radio Mystery Theater (1974–82), and was also one of the five hosts on Sears Radio Theater (as the Friday "adventure night" host) from 1979-81.

Broadway and films[link]

Widmark with Victor Mature in the trailer for Kiss of Death (1947)

Widmark appeared on Broadway in 1943 in F. Hugh Herbert's Kiss and Tell. He was unable to join the military during World War II because of a perforated eardrum. He was in Chicago appearing in a stage production of Dream Girl with June Havoc when 20th Century Fox signed him to a seven-year contract.^[5]

Widmark's first movie appearance was in 1947's Kiss of Death, as the giggling, sociopathic villain Tommy Udo.^[6] His most notorious scene found Udo pushing a wheelchair-bound woman (played by Mildred Dunnock) down a flight of stairs to her death.^[4] Widmark was almost not cast. He said, "The director, Henry Hathaway, didn't want me. I have a high forehead; he thought I looked too intellectual." Hathaway was overruled by studio boss Darryl F. Zanuck. "Hathaway gave me kind of a bad time," recalled Widmark.^[5] Kiss of Death was a commercial and critical success: Widmark won the Golden Globe Award for New Star Of The Year - Actor, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance.^[6] Widmark's character was also the inspiration for the song The Ballad of Tommy Udo by the band Kaleidoscope. He played Dude in the 1948 Western film Yellow Sky with Gregory Peck and Anne Baxter.

In 1950, Widmark co-starred with Paul Douglas, Barbara Bel Geddes, Jack Palance and Zero Mostel in Elia Kazan's Panic in the Streets, and appeared opposite Gene Tierney in Jules Dassin's Night and the City. Both are considered classic examples of film noir. As well, in 1950 Widmark starred with Sidney Potier in the gripping racial melodrama No Way Out .

In 1952, Widmark had his handprints cast in cement at Grauman's Chinese Theatre. During his stint at Fox, he appeared in The Street with No Name (1948), Don't Bother to Knock (1952) with Marilyn Monroe, and Pickup on South Street (1953). He also appeared in Vincente Minnelli's 1955 cult film The Cobweb with Lauren Bacall.

He starred in and also produced a drama set during the Cold War, The Bedford Incident (1965). He is also credited with producing his films Time Limit (1957) and The Secret Ways (1961). Other notable films in the 1960s were The Alamo (1960), Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), How the West Was Won (1962) and Cheyenne Autumn (1964). During the 1970s, Widmark's films included Murder on the Orient Express (1974), Coma (1978), and The Swarm (1978). In all, Widmark appeared in over 60 films before making his final movie appearance in the 1991 thriller True Colors.^[1]

Television[link]

Widmark in Broken Lance (1954)

Widmark was a guest on What's My Line? in 1954. The following year, he made a rare foray into comedy on I Love Lucy, portraying himself when a star-struck Lucy trespasses onto his property to steal a souvenir. Widmark finds Lucy sprawled out on his living room floor underneath a bear skin rug.

Returning to television in the early 1970s, Widmark received an Emmy nomination for his performance as the U.S. President in the TV movie Vanished (1971), a Fletcher Knebel political thriller. In 1972-73, he reprised his detective role from Madigan (1968) with six 90-minute episodes on the NBC Wednesday Mystery Movie. The mini-series Benjamin Franklin (1974) was a unique experiment of four 90-minute dramas, each with a different actor performing the title role: Widmark, Beau Bridges, Lloyd Bridges, Eddie Albert, Melvyn Douglas and Willie Aames (Franklin at age 12). The series won a Peabody Award and five Emmys. During the 1980s, Widmark returned to TV with a half-dozen TV movies.

Personal life[link]

Widmark speaking in France, 1991

From 1942 until her death in 1997, Widmark was married to playwright Jean Hazlewood. The marriage produced a daughter, Anne Heath Widmark, an artist and author who was married to baseball player Sandy Koufax from 1969 to 1982. In 1999, Widmark married socialite Susan Blanchard, who had been Henry Fonda's third wife.

Green City, Missouri, is the site of Widmark Airport ((FAA LID: MO83)) in extreme northeastern Missouri. Towns the size of Green City (pop. 688 in 2000) usually do not have airports, but Richard Widmark owned a cattle ranch in the area during the 1950s and 1960s. Widmark contributed funds to the construction of an airport which led to its being named in his honor.

Despite having spent most of his career appearing countless times in gun-toting roles such as cowboys, policemen, gangsters and military men he loathed real-life gunplay and got involved in several gun-control initiatives and drives. In 1976 he famously stated

I know I've made kind of a half-assed career out of violence, but I abhor violence. I am an ardent supporter of gun control. It seems incredible to me that the United States are the only civilized nation that does not put some effective control on guns.

—Richard Widmark, ^[7]

Death[link]

Widmark died after a long illness on March 24, 2008, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut at age 93. Widmark's illness had been aggravated by a fall, he suffered the previous year. At the 2009 Academy Awards, Richard Widmark was honored in the Memorial Tribute.

Filmography[link]