John Saxon, the actor, who has died aged 83, was probably best-known for his role as the martial artist Roper in Enter the Dragon (1973), Bruce Lee’s final film and the one which made him a star beyond Asia.
By then, Saxon had already tasted stardom himself, and though often still cast for his handsome looks he was leaving behind his years as a leading man to become more of an authority figure character actor. Paradoxically, this ultimately enabled him to show the range of which he was capable in what proved, for a teen idol of the 1950s, a notably long career.
Spotted by a scout coming out of a cinema in Times Square when he should have been in high school, Saxon began as a photographic model. The agent Henry Willson, who promoted good-looking “beefcake” actors such as Rock Hudson, soon noticed a magazine shot of Saxon. Within days, he had a Hollywood contract – though as he was under age his parents signed it for him.
A brief early part was as an usher in the Judy Garland version of A Star is Born (1954). A strong performance as a stalker, of Esther Williams, in The Unguarded Moment (1955) raised his profile, and by the time he was paired with Sandra Dee in The Restless Years (1957) he was receiving 3,000 fan letters a week.
The following year, he shared the Golden Globe award for New Star with James Garner, and appeared with Dee and Rex Harrison in The Reluctant Debutante, and opposite Debbie Reynolds in This Happy Feeling, directed by Blake Edwards.
Saxon – a stage name – was of Italian descent, and his looks allowed him in the Hollywood of the day to be cast as many races, notably as a Mexican outlaw in The Appaloosa (1966), with Marlon Brando, for which Saxon was nominated for a Golden Globe. He was also teamed with Clint Eastwood in Joe Kidd (1972).
This Happy Feeling, poster, US poster art, from left: Debbie Reynolds, John Saxon, Curd Jurgens, 1958. (Photo by LMPC via Getty Images)HyperFocal: 0
The following year came Enter the Dragon, in which Saxon – who had studied some judo and karate – had top billing as a gambler forced by debt to take part in a deadly martial arts tournament on a mysterious island.
Saxon’s standing was such that the script was changed to accommodate his wish that his character, rather than Jim Kelly’s black karate champion, survives the film. Yet while it was Lee’s charisma and skills which made the picture a colossal hit, Saxon was able to display some of the charm and self-deprecating wit that in other circumstances might have made him a bigger star.
The eldest of three children, he was born Carmine Oricco in Brooklyn on August 5 1936. His father was a painter and decorator, and as a boy Saxon worked on the fairground stalls at Coney Island.
From the 1970s onwards, he appeared mainly on television, for instance as a recurring character in The Six Million Dollar Man and The Bionic Woman. He also had spells in Falcon Crest and Dynasty, and guest-starred in shows such as Starsky & Hutch and The A-Team.
On the big screen in that era, he was perhaps best remembered as the father of Freddy Krueger’s adversary Heather in the Nightmare on Elm Street series of horror films. Saxon had been seen over the years in several Italian horror films, or gialli, working with directors such as Mario Bava and Dario Argento, and it became one of his favourite genres. He also featured, with Dennis Hopper, in Roger Corman’s Queen of Blood (1966).
His final roles included From Dusk Till Dawn (1996), which was co-written by Quentin Tarantino, and an episode of CSI directed by him.
John Saxon is survived by his third wife, Gloria, and by two sons.
David Brian was born in 1914 in New York City. He was signed to a contract by Warner Brothers in 1949 and starred opposite Joan Crawford in “The Damned Don’t Cry. His other films include “The High and the Mighty” in 1954 with John Wayne and “The Rare Breed” with James Stewart and Maureen O’Hara. He was married to Adrian Booth. David Brian died in 1993 at the age of 78.
IMDB entry:
New Yorker, who, after schooling at City College, found work as a doorman, before entering show business with a song-and-dance routine in vaudeville and in night clubs. He did a wartime stint with the Coast Guard and returned to acting on the New York stage after the war. Persuaded by Joan Crawford to try his hand at film acting, he joined her in Hollywood and, in 1949, signed a contract with Warner Brothers. In his feature debut, Flamingo Road (1949), he played a political boss infatuated with Crawford’s carnival girl. Brian’s most critically acclaimed performance was as the fair-minded, resourceful Southern lawyer defending condemned, but innocent Juano Hernandez from a vicious, bigoted lynch mob, in Intruder in the Dust (1949). For this role, he was nominated for a Golden Globe Award as Best Supporting Actor.
Brian portrayed a powerful gang leader in The Damned Don’t Cry (1950), again opposite Crawford. In spite of his commanding presence in the film, his performance was somewhat compromised by a cliche-laden script. In This Woman Is Dangerous (1952), it was Crawford who played the criminal, and Brian the role of her insanely jealous paramour. For the remainder of the decade and into the 1960’s, Brian played an assortment of western heavies on the big screen notably raider leader Austin McCool in Springfield Rifle (1952) and saloon owner Dick Braden in Dawn at Socorro (1954) – and did the same with equal verve on television, in Gunsmoke (1955). An incisive actor with sardonic looks and a hard-edge to his voice, Brian was more often than not typecast as ruthless or manipulating types. Somewhat against character, he essayed a weakling in the ground-breaking airborne drama The High and the Mighty (1954).
On the right side of the law, he starred as crusading D.A. Paul Garrett in his own courtroom drama series, Mr. District Attorney (1954), reprising his earlier role on radio. In 1968, he also made a contribution to Star Trek (1966), as John Gill, a Federation cultural observer on the planet Ekos, whose experiment in creating a government based on National Socialist principles goes disastrously wrong.
In private life, Brian was a noted fundraiser for the Volunteers of America, a well-known non-profit charitable organisation.
– IMDb Mini Biography By: I.S.Mowis
The above IMDB entry can also be accessed online here.
Andrew Prine was born in 1936 in Florida. He appeared in the 1959 Broadway production of Thomas Wolfe’s “Look Homeward Angel”. In 1962 he starred on television with Earl Holliman in the series “The Wide Country”. His films include “Texas Across the River” in 1966, “The Devil’s Brigade”and “Chisum” in 1970 with John Wayne. He has starred and guest starred on most of the major television series over the past 40 years.
Appearing on Broadway, Andrew Prine soared to recognition in the leading role of the Pulitzer Prize winning play, Look Homeward Angel, and in his film role in the Academy award winner, The Miracle Worker (1962). He has worked with Hollywood legends such as John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, William Holden, Glenn Ford, Dean Martin, Ben Johnson, Carl Reiner, Raquel Welch, and Anne Bancroft. When Westerns were king on television, he was the frequent guest star almost every week on the all the shows.
His appearance in Western theatrical feature films include Chisum (1970), Bandolero! (1968), Texas Across the River (1966), and Gettysburg (1993). Not only appearing on television in war dramas, Prine had to learn to ski while filming The Devil’s Brigade (1968), shot in Italy with an all star cast that included William Holden, Cliff Robertson, Richard Jaeckel and Claude Atkins. Andrew starred in several television series, beginning with Earl Holiman in the series,Wide Country (1962), and joined forces with Barry Sullivan in, The Road West(1966), and in W.E.B. (1978), he portrayed the network executive, Dan Costello.
Adept at comedy, he co-starred in the series, Room For Two (1992), and was featured in the cast of, Weird Science (1994). A member of the prestigious Actor’s Studio, Andrew’s work in theatre includes Long Day’s Journey Into Night with Charlton Heston and Deborah Kerr, The Caine Mutiny directed by Henry Fonda, and Sam Shepard’s Buried Child where he received his second Dramalogue Critics Award for Best Actor the leading role. Displaying his acting range by portraying a variety of characters in his long career, Andrew Prine has delighted fans of many genres; Westerns, Military, Science Fictions and Horror, and is considered one of Hollywood’s consummate actors.
– IMDb Mini Biography By: Author: Deborah Miller
The above IMDB entry cn also be accessed online here.
Andrew Prine died while on vacation in Paris at the age of 86.
Daily Star Trek News obituary in 2022:
NOVEMBER 7, 2022 – He was a self-described “working actor,” who made over 180 film and television appearances and “never met a film role [he] didn’t like.” Andrew Prine died of natural causes last Monday in Paris at the age of 86, according to The Hollywood Reprter.
Star Trek fans will remember Prine for his roles as the Tilonian military officer, Suna, in Star Trek: The Next Generation’s season six episode, “Frame of Mind” and as the Cardassian, Legate Turrel, in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s season three episode, “Life Support.”
Prine started out on Broadway, taking over for Anthony Perkins in Look Homeward Angel, about which he said, “Fortunately, I did Look Homeward for two years, and what I did while playing the lead and being paid was learn how to act. The stage manager came backstage every night with copious notes, and his job was to keep me on target. I learned how to act, really, on Broadway.”
He soon made his way to Hollywood after being scouted for a role in Wide Country, with Earl Holliman. He appeared in many westerns, both in film and on television, and received a Golden Boot Award in 2001. The Golden Boots were sponsored and presented by the Motion Picture & Television Fund from 1983 – 2007 to honor actors, actresses, and crew members who made significant contributions to the genre of Westerns in television and film.
Prine also made many appearances outside the western genre, ranging from Doctor Kildare and Gene Roddenberry’s The Lieutenant to the Weird Science TV series and Boston Legal.
Prine’s wife, actress-producer Heather Lowe, said of Prine, “He was the sweetest prince
Van Williams was born in Fort Worth, Texas in 1934. He is best remembered for his role in the 1960’s television series “The Green Hornet” which also featured Bruce Lee. A prior television series of his was “Surfside Six” in 1960 which also featured Troy Donahue and Lee Patterson, all pictured above. His films include “Tall Story” and “The Caretakers”. He died in 2016 at the age of 82.
Gary Brumburgh’s entry:
You could shoehorn actor Van Williams right in there between the other tall, dark and drop-jaw gorgeous heartthrobs Tom Tryon and John Gavin of the late 1950s/early 1960s who conveyed a similar bland, heroic image. All three were too often given colorless heroes to play on film and/or TV — roles that played off their charm but seldom tested their talent.
Born on February 27, 1934 as Van Zandt Jarvis Williams, he was the son of a cattle rancher. He majored in animal husbandry and business at Texas Christian University but moved to Hawaii which changed the course of his life. While operating a salvage company and a skin-diving school during the mid-1950s, he was approached by Elizabeth Taylor and husband/producer Mike Todd, who were filming there. Encouraged by Todd to try his luck, Van arrived in Hollywood with no experience. Todd perished in a plane crash before he was able to help Van, but the young hopeful ventured on anyway, taking some acting/voice lessons, and was almost immediately cast in dramatic TV roles.
Warner Brothers had a keen eye for this type of photogenic hunk and smartly signed Van. Fitting in perfectly, he was soon showing just how irresistible he was as a clean-cut private eye on the series Bourbon Street Beat (1959). Although the show lasted only one season, Warners carried his Kenny Madison character into the more popular adventure drama Surfside 6 (1960) opposite fellow pin-up / blond beefcake bookend Troy Donahue. Series-wise, Van tried comedy next opposite Walter Brennan in The Tycoon (1964) . After his contract expired at Warners, 20th Century-Fox handed him his most vividly recalled part, that of the emerald-suited superhero The Green Hornet (1966) with the late Bruce Lee as his agile, Robin-like counterpart Kato. The show, inspired by the huge cult hitBatman (1966) enjoyed a fast start but, like its predecessor, met an equally untimely finish.
Never a strong draw in films, Van revealed quite a bit of himself (literally) in his debut inTall Story (1960) coming out of a shower. He was handed a typically staid second lead inThe Caretakers (1963). Continuing well into the 1970s to guest sporadically on the TV scene in classics like The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961), Love, American Style (1969),Mission: Impossible (1966), The Big Valley (1965)”, Nanny and the Professor (1970),Barnaby Jones (1973), and The Rockford Files (1974). Another starring series attempt with Westwind (1975) failed to make the grade and he soon let his career go. Van went on quite successfully in business with telecommunications, real estate and law enforcement supplies among his ventures. With his glossy, pretty-boy years far behind him, he has not felt the need to look back except for an occasional autograph convention.
– IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Brumburgh / gr-home@pacbell.net
2519488 Mac Coy aux poings d\’or: KILLER McCOY, US poster, from left: Brian Donlevy, Mickey Rooney, Ann Blyth, 1947; (add.info.: Affiche du film Mac Coy aux poings d\’or (KILLER McCOY) de Roy Rowland avec Brian Donlevy, Mickey Rooney, Ann Blyth, 1947 ); Everett Collection.2447171 Behind Prison Gates: BEHIND PRISON GATES, standing l-r: Jacqueline Wells, Brian Donlevy, Richard Fiske on poster art, 1939; (add.info.: Affiche du film BEHIND PRISON GATES de Charles Barton avec standing l-r: Jacqueline Wells, Brian Donlevy, Richard Fiske on poster art, 1939); Everett Collection.EVT5783509 STAND BY FOR ACTION, US poster, Robert Taylor, Charles Laughton, Marilyn Maxwell, Brian Donlevy, 1942; (add.info.: STAND BY FOR ACTION, US poster, Robert Taylor, Charles Laughton, Marilyn Maxwell, Brian Donlevy, 1942); Everett Collection.
Brian Donlevy was born in 1901 in Northern Ireland. His parents moved to the U.S. when he was an infant. His breaththrough film role came in 1935 when he was cast with Edward G. Robinson in “Barbary Coast”. He went on to star in “Beau Geste”, “The Great McGinty”, “An American Romance” and “The Miracle of Morgans Creek”. He died in 1972 at the age of 71.
IMDB entry:
It seems that Brian Donlevy started out life as colorfully as any character he ever played on the stage or screen. He lied about his age (he was actually 14) in 1916 so he could join the army. When Gen. John J. Pershing sent American troops to invade Mexico in pursuit of Pancho Villa–Mexican rebels under Villa’s command raided Columbus, NM, and killed 16 American soldiers and civilians–Donlevy served with that expedition and later, in WW I, was a pilot with the Lafayette Escadrille, a unit of the French Air Force comprised of American and Canadian pilots. His schooling was in Cleveland, OH, but in addition he spent two years at the US Naval Academy at Annapolis, MD. However, he gave up on a military career for the stage. After having landed several smaller roles, he got a part in “What Price Glory” and established himself as a bona fide actor. Later such roles on stage as “Three for One”, “The Milky Way” and “Life Begins at 8:30” gave him the experience to head off to Hollywood. Donlevy began his Hollywood career with the silent film A Man of Quality (1926) and his first talkie was Gentlemen of the Press (1929) (in which he had a bit part). There was a five- to six-year gap before he reappeared on the film scene in 1935 with three pictures: Mary Burns, Fugitive (1935), Another Face(1935) and Barbary Coast (1935), which was his springboard into film history. Receiving rave reviews as “the tough guy all in black”, acting jobs finally began to roll his way. In 1936 he starred in seven films, including Strike Me Pink (1936), in which he played the tough guy to Eddie Cantor‘s sweet bumpkin Eddie Pink. In all, from 1926 to 1969 Donlevy starred in at least 89 films, reprising one of his Broadway roles as a prizefighter in The Milky Way (1940), and had his own television series (which he also produced), Dangerous Assignment (1952). In 1939 he received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of the sadistic Sgt. Markoff in Paramount’s Beau Geste (1939), its remake of an earlier silent hit. The Great McGinty (1940), a Preston Sturges comedy about a poor homeless slob who makes it to Governor of a state with the mob’s help, is a brilliant character study of a man and the changes he goes through to please himself, those around him and, eventually, the woman he loves. A line in the film, spoken by Mrs. McGinty, seems a fitting description of the majority of roles Brian Donlevy would play throughout his career: “. . . You’re a tough guy, McGinty, not a wrong guy.” Donlevy’s ability to make the roughest edge of any character have a soft side was his calling card. He perfected it and no one has quite mastered it since. He later, in 1944, reprised that role in The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek (1944). By 1935 Donlevy was working for 20th Century-Fox and had just completed filming 36 Hours to Kill (1936) when he became engaged to young singer Marjorie Lane, and they married the next year. The marriage produced one child, Judy, but ended in divorce in 1947. It was 19 years before he remarried. In 1966, Bela Lugosi‘s ex-wife Lillian became Mrs. Brian Donlevy, and they were married until his death in 1972. Donlevy had always derived great pleasure from his two diverse interests, gold mining and writing poetry, so it was fitting that after his last film, Pit Stop (1969), he retired to Palm Springs, CA, where he began to write short stories and had his income well supplemented from a prosperous California tungsten mine he owned. Having gone in for throat surgery in 1971 he re-entered the Motion Picture County Hospital in Woodland Hills, CA, on March 10th, 1972. Less than a month later, on April 6, he passed away from cancer.
– IMDb Mini Biography By: Jane Byron Dean <McGinty@aol.com>
The above IMDB entry cn also be accessed online her
Nils Asther was born in Denmark in 1897. He was brought up in Sweden. He appeared in Swedish and German silent films from 1918 until 1926. In 1927 he went to Hollywood where he made his first U.S. film “Topsy and Eva”. He made films with Greta Garbo and Joan Crawford. In 1933 he made “The Bitter Tea of General Yen” with Barbara Stanwyck. Between 1935 and 1940 he made films in the U.K. He then returned to Hollywood and made films there until 1949. In 1958 he returned to Sweden where he died in 1981 at the age of 84.
IMDB entry:
Nils Asther was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 1897 and raised in Malmö, Sweden, by his wealthy Swedish parents. After attending the Royal Dramatic Theater School in Stockholm, he began his stage career in Copenhagen. His film debut came in 1916 when the director Mauritz Stiller cast him in the lead role (as an aspiring actor, appropriately enough) in the Swedish film Vingarne (1916). After working with Victor Sjöström in Sweden and Michael Curtiz in Germany, Asther moved to Hollywood in 1927, where his exotic looks landed him romantic roles with co-stars such as Greta Garbo, Pola Negri, andJoan Crawford. Although his foreign accent was a hindrance in “talkies”, his Hollywood career continued until 1934 when he was blacklisted for breaking a contract and went to Britain for four years. After his return to Hollywood in 1938, his career declined and by 1949 he was driving a truck. In 1958, he returned to Sweden, where he remained until his death, making occasional appearances in television and on stage.
– IMDb Mini Biography By: Lyn Hammond
The above IMDB entry can also be accessed online here.
TCM Overview:
Dashing, smooth leading man of late silent films and the first decade of talkies, in the USA from 1927. Tall and often mustachioed, Asther proved a capable and attractive romantic lead opposite Greta Garbo in “The Single Standard” (1929) and Barbara Stanwyck in “The Bitter Tea of General Yen” (1933). He continued playing supporting roles into the 1940s.
2470633 Barbe-bleue: BLUEBEARD, Nils Asther, John Carradine, Ludwig Stossel, Jean Parker (top, left row), 1944; (add.info.: Affiche du film Barbe bleue (BLUEBEARD) de Edgar G.); Everett Collection.
Although younger brother Dean Stockwell is perhaps the better known actor of the two, Guy Stockwell was a seriously handsome, reliable performer over the years, appearing in over 30 films and 200 television shows. The son of singing performer Harry Stockwell andNina Olivette (she also went by the name Betty Veronica), their mother sent both Dean and Guy to an open call for a 1943 Broadway show entitled “The Innocent Voyage,” which was to star famed acting teacher Herbert Berghof. The play needed about a dozen children and, by chance, both boys were cast. Dean went immediately into films for MGM and became a popular post-war child star while Guy had to wait until adulthood before coming into his own. Following high school he attended the University of California where he majored in psychology and philosophy.
Guy started his career off in minor film and TV bits, then was given his big break in 1961 as a regular cast member of the outdoor sea adventure Adventures in Paradise (1959) as first mate to star Gardner McKay. He played the role for one season. Following that in 1963 he became one of 11 performers who made up the company for Richard Boone‘s television anthology series. Guy became a Universal contract player in 1965 and went straight into several standard tales of adventure and intrigue, including The War Lord(1965), Tobruk (1967) and Blindfold (1965). Initially promoted as a dashing Errol Flynntype in swordplay adventures and outdoor epics, the studio had him star in the remake ofGary Cooper‘s French Foreign Legion classic Beau Geste (1966) opposite another film up-and-comer Doug McClure. He co-starred with McClure again, this time as the villain, inThe King’s Pirate (1967) while vying for beauties Jill St. John and Mary Ann Mobley. He also earned the role of Buffalo Bill Cody in a remake of Cooper’s The Plainsman (1966). Playing a villain again in the glossy soaper Banning (1967) with Robert Wagner and Ms. St. John, most of Guy’s high-profile roles came off routine at best and the films failed at the box office. He made his last picture for Universal co-starring with Anthony Franciosain In Enemy Country (1968) before his contract ended.
Guy subsequently gravitated towards the small screen and local stage. He created the Los Angeles Art Theater along the way where he played leading roles in well-received productions of “Hamlet” and his own adaptation of “Crime and Punishment.”. Gaining respect in later years as an acting teacher, he wrote a textbook for actors called Cold Reading Advantage (1991) and taught acting (as an alumnus at the University of California) for two years in their masters program. Subsequent character parts in films were a bit offbeat to say the least, having gained some weight over time. He was also involved in extensive voice-over work.
Married and divorced three times, he had two children, Doug and Victoria, by first wife Susan; an adopted son, Kerry, by second wife Sandy; and had several stepchildren by his marriage to third wife Olga. Guy suffered from diabetes in later years and died of complications in 2002. He was 68.
– IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Brumburgh / gr-home@pacbell.net
Sword Of Zorro, poster, (aka THE THREE SWORDS OF ZORRO, aka LE TRE SPADE DE ZORRO), Italian poster, Guy Stockwell, 1963. (Photo by LMPC via Getty Images)
Carlos Thompson was born in Buenos Aires the Argentine to Swiss-German parents in 1923. He began his career in 1954 in Hollywood films such as “The Flame and the Flesh” with Lana Turner and Pier Angeli and “Port Afrique” with Yvonne de Carlo. In the sixties he moved to German and concentrated on making European films. He also became an established author. He was married to the actress Lilli Palmer. Carlos Thompson died in 1990 in Buenos Aires at the age of 67.
“Wikipedia” entry:
Of GermanSwiss descent, he played leading roles on stage and in films in Argentina. He went to Hollywood in the 1950s and was typically cast as a European womanizer.
He moved to Europe and appeared in a large number of German films. He was chiefly known to English speakers for his appearance as Carlos Varela in the 1963 ITC Entertainment series The Sentimental Agent.
In the late 1960s, Thompson left acting to become a writer and TV producer.
His first success on the European book market was The assassination of Winston Churchill (1969), a refutation of allegations byDavid Irving (Accident. The Death of General Sikorski, 1967) and the German playwright Rolf Hochhuth (Soldiers, premièred in the UK in 1968, London) that war time premier Winston Churchill had a part in the death of Polish General Władysław Sikorski, who perished in an air plane crash at Gibraltar on July 4, 1943, allegedly due to sabotage. Carlos Thompson married German-born actress Lilli Palmer shortly after her divorce from Rex Harrison in 1957. They remained married until her death in 1986. Four years after his wife’s death, Thompson committed suicide in Buenos Aires by a gunshot to his head.
The above “Wikipedia” entry can also be accessed online here.
“Hollywood, or at least MGM, rather underestimated Howard Keel. He was launched as a star in “Anne Get Your Gun” but then shuffled off sometimes into second-leads or into second features. He was given boorish parts to play – modelled on his role in ‘Annie’ -or stood up as the conventional leading-man prop. That he did so well despite this was due to the fact that this was the heyday of screen musicals, many of which he carried to success almost single-handedly. There was no other big-voiced baritone in films at the time – at his best he outclassed all the others of like ilk – Lanza, Eddy, Allan Jones. His voice was warm and lusty. He had a fetching grin and though few of his parts called upon him to do more than swagger he did it with a disarming ease. In these days when the MGM musical is seen in all it’s achievement
Howard Keel was born in 1919 in Gillespie, Illinois. In 1947 he came to post-War London and captivated audiences with his stage performance as “Curley” in “Oaklaholma”. While in Britian he made his film debut in “The Small Voice” opposite Valerie Hobson. He won a contract with MGM starting with “Annie Get Your Gun”. He went on to make “Seven Brides for Seven Brothers”, “Kismet” “Kiss Me Kate” and “Rose Marie”. For Warner Brothers he made “Calamity Jane” with Doris Day. Witn the decline oif movie musicals in the late 50’s he began singing in supper clubs across the U.S. He had a major career revival in the 1980’s with his role in the long running “Dallas”. Howard Keel died in 2004 at the age of 85.
Gary Brumburgh’s entry:
Tough, virile, wavy-haired and ruggedly handsome with trademark forlorn-looking brows that added an intriguing touch of vulnerability to his hard outer core, actor Howard Duff and his wife-at-the-time, actress Ida Lupino, were one of Hollywood’s premiere film couples during the 1950s “Golden Age”. Prior to that, Duff had relationships with a number of the cinema’s most dazzling leading ladies, including Ava Gardner (just prior to her marriage to musician Artie Shaw) and Gloria DeHaven.
Duff’s talent first manifested itself on radio as Dashiell Hammett‘s popular private eye “Sam Spade” (1946-1950), and eventually extended to include stage, film and TV. While never considered a top-tier movie star and, despite his obvious prowess, never considered for any acting awards, Howard Duff was an undeniably strong good guy and potent heavy but perhaps lacked the requisite charisma or profile to move into the ranks of a Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas or Robert Mitchum. His career spanned over four decades.
His full name was Howard Green Duff and he was born in Bremerton, Washington on November 24, 1913. Growing up in and around the Seattle area, he attended Roosevelt High School where he played basketball. It was here that he also found an outlet acting in school plays and, following graduation, studied drama. He eventually became an acting member of the Repertory Playhouse in Seattle. Military service interrupted his early career and he served with the U.S. Army Air Force’s radio service from 1941 to 1945. Upon his discharge, he returned to his acting pursuits and won the role of “Sam Spade” on NBC Radio in the role Humphrey Bogart made famous in The Maltese Falcon (1941).Lurene Tuttle played his altruistic secretary “Effie” on the series. He eventually left the program when his film career settled in and Stephen Dunne took over the radio voice of the detective in 1950 for its final season.
Duff’s post-war movie career started completely on the right foot at Universal with the hard-hitting film noir Brute Force (1947), in which he received good notices as an ill-fated cellmate to Burt Lancaster, Charles Bickford and others. Quite well-known for his radio voice by this time, he was given special billing in the movie’s credits as “Radio’s Sam Spade”. This was followed by equally vital and volatile performances in the prescient semi-documentary-styled police drama The Naked City (1948) and in Arthur Miller‘s taut family drama All My Sons (1948) starring Lancaster, again, and Edward G. Robinson.
After such a strong showing, Howard career went into a period of moviemaking in which his films were more noted for its entertainment and rousing action than as character-driven pieces. A number of them were routine westerns that paired him opposite some of Hollywood’s loveliest ladies: Red Canyon (1949) with Ann Blyth, Calamity Jane and Sam Bass (1949) with Yvonne De Carlo and The Lady from Texas (1951) with Mona Freeman. Other adventure-oriented flicks that more or less came and went included Spaceways(1953), Tanganyika (1954), The Yellow Mountain (1954), Flame of the Islands (1956),Blackjack Ketchum, Desperado (1956) (title role), The Broken Star (1956) and Sierra Stranger (1957). Howard also began appearing infrequently on the stage in the early 1950s with such productions as “Season in the Sun” (1952) and “Anniversary Waltz” (1954).
Those films that rose above the standard included gritty top-billed roles in Johnny Stool Pigeon (1949), Illegal Entry (1949), Shakedown (1950), Spy Hunt (1950) and Woman in Hiding (1950), the last a film noir which paired him with Ida Lupino for the first time. Here, he plays the hero who saves Lupino from a murdering husband (Stephen McNally). In 1951, he married Ms. Lupino, already a well-established star at Warner Bros., who was coming into her own recently as a director. The couple had one daughter, Bridget Duff, born in 1952. Lupino and Duff co-starred in four hard-boiled film dramas during the 1950s — Jennifer (1953), Private Hell 36 (1954), Women’s Prison (1955) and While the City Sleeps (1956). The demise of the studio-guided contract system had an effect on Howard’s film career and offers started drying up in the late 1950s.
Fortunately, he found just as wide an appeal on TV, appearing in a number of dramatic showcases for Science Fiction Theatre (1955), Lux Video Theatre (1950) and Climax!(1954). And, in a change of pace, the married couple decided to go for laughs by starring together in the TV series Mr. Adams and Eve (1957). Here, they played gregarious husband-and-wife film stars “Howard Adams” and “Eve Drake”. Many of the scripts, though broadly exaggerated for comic effect, were reportedly based on a few of their own real-life experiences. They also guest-starred in an entertaining hour-long episode of theThe Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour (1957) in 1959 with the two couples inadvertently booked at the same vacant lodge, together. The show ends up a battle-of-the sexes, free-for-all with the two gals scheming to add a little romance to what has essentially become a fishing vacation for the guys. The 1960s bore more fruit on TV than in film. Sans Lupino, Duff went solo as nightclub owner “Willie Dante” in the tongue-in-cheek adventure seriesDante (1960), which lasted less than a season. A few years later, the veteran co-starred with handsome rookie Dennis Cole in what is perhaps his best-remembered series, the police drama Felony Squad (1966), which was filmed in and around Los Angeles. Duff directed one of those episodes, having directed several episodes of the silly sitcom Camp Runamuck (1965), a year or so earlier. In between series work were guest assignments on such popular primetime shows as Bonanza (1959), Twilight Zone (1959), Burke’s Law(1963) and Combat! (1962).
The marriage of Ida and Howard did not last, however, and the famous married couple separated in 1966 after 15 years of marriage. Ida and Howard didn’t officially divorce, however, until 1984. Howard later married a non-professional, Judy Jenkinson, who survived him. While much of Howard’s work in later years was standard, if unmemorable, every now and then he would demonstrate the fine talent he was. A couple of his better film performances came as a sex-minded, booze-swilling relative in A Wedding (1978) and as Dustin Hoffman‘s attorney in the Oscar-winning drama Kramer vs. Kramer (1979). He also enjoyed a villainous role in the short-lived series Flamingo Road (1980) and had a lengthy stint on Knots Landing (1979) during the 1984-1985 season. Duff died at age 76 of a heart attack, on July 8, 1990, in Santa Barbara, California.
– IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Brumburgh / gr-home@pacbell.net
