Steven Geray (1904 - 1973)

He was born in Ungvár, Austria-Hungary (now called Uzhgorod, Ukraine) and educated at the University of Budapest. He made his first stage appearance at the Hungarian National Theater under his real name and after nearly four years he made his London Stage debut (as Steven Geray) in 1934, appearing in Happy Week-End! and began appearing […]

Dennis Price (1915 - 1973)

Price was born in Twyford in Berkshire, the son of Brigadier-General Thomas Rose Caradoc Price CMG DSO and his wife Dorothy, née Verey, daughter of Sir Henry Verey, Official Referee of the Supreme Court of Judicature. He attended Copthorne Prep School, Radley College and Worcester College, Oxford. He studied acting at the Embassy Theatre School […]

Douglas Kennedy (1915 - 1973)

Douglas Kennedy was a character player and occasional leading man in Hollywood. He attended Deerfield Academy in Deerfield, Massachusetts, and afterwards graduated from Amherst College in Amherst, Massachusetts. Making his debut in 1935, he played a significant number of supporting roles and was able to secure contract-player status, first at Paramount Pictures and later at […]

Tim Holt (1919 - 1973)

Tim Holt was born Charles John Holt III on born February 5, 1919, in Beverly Hills, California, the son of actor Jack Holt and Margaret Woods. During his early years, he accompanied his father on location, even appearing in an early silent film. Holt was educated at Culver Military Academy in Culver, Indiana, graduating in […]

Cecil Kellaway (1890 - 1973)

Cecil Kellaway was born on 22 August 1890 in Cape Town, South Africa, where he gained an early interest in theatre acting, much to the displeasure of his parents. He was educated in South Africa and England, before becoming a touring stock company actor. By the early 1920s, he had settled in Australia, becoming a […]

Betty Field (1913 - 1973)

Born in Boston, Massachusetts, to George and Katharine (née Lynch) Field, Betty Field began her acting career on the London stage in Howard Lindsay’s farce, She Loves Me Not. Following its run she returned to the United States and appeared in several stage successes, before making her film debut in 1939. Her role as Mae, […]

Sidney Blackmer (1895 - 1973)

Sidney Blackmer was born and raised in Salisbury, North Carolina, the son of Clara Deroulhac (née Alderman) and Walter Steele Blackmer. He started off in an insurance and financial business but gave up on it. While working as a builder’s laborer on a new building, he saw a Pearl White serial being filmed and immediately […]

Peggie Castle (1927 - 1973)

Peggie Castle was born Peggy Blair in Appalachia in Wise County in far southwestern Virginia. She changed her last name from Blair “because there was another actress named Blair at the first studio in which she worked.” Her father, Doyle H. Blair, was at one point “an industrial relations director for a large corporation” and later […]

Allan Lane (1909 - 1973)

Allan Lane was born as Harry Leonard Albershardt in Indiana to Linnie Anne and William H. Albershardt. He grew up in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Lane had been a photographer, model and stage actor by age 20. He was spotted by Fox Film Corporation (later 20th Century Fox) talent scouts and was signed to a contract. […]

Melville Cooper (1896 - 1973)

George Melville Cooper was born on 15 October 1896 in Aston, Birmingham, Warwickshire to W.C.J. and Frances (née Brennan) Cooper. He was brought up in Britain and attended public schools, including King Edward’s School in Birmingham. He began to develop an interest in acting as a teenager. At the age of eighteen, he made his […]

Mantan Moreland (1902 - 1973)

Born in Monroe, Louisiana, to Frank, an old-time Dixie band leader, and Marcella, Mantan Moreland began acting by the time he was an adolescent, running away to join a minstrel show in 1910. By the late 1920s, he had made his way through vaudeville, working with various shows and revues, performing on Broadway and touring […]

Edna Best (1900 - 1974)

Edna Best (3 March 1900 – 18 September 1974) was a British actress. Born in Hove, Sussex, England, she was educated in Brighton and later studied dramatic acting under Miss Kate Rorke who was the first Professor of Drama at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London. Best was known on the London stage […]

Clive Brook (1887 - 1974)

Clive Brook (born Clifford Hardman Brook, 1 June 1887 – 17 November 1974) was a British film actor. After making his first screen appearance in 1920, Brook emerged as a leading British actor in the early 1920s. After moving to the United States, Brook became one of the major stars for Paramount Pictures in the late […]

Johnny Mack Brown (1904 - 1974)

Born and raised in Dothan, Alabama, Johnny Mack Brown was a star of the high school football team, earning a football scholarship to the University of Alabama. His little brother Tolbert “Red” Brown played with “Mack” in 1925. His good looks and powerful physique saw him portrayed on Wheaties cereal boxes and in 1927, brought an […]

Patricia Collinge (1892 - 1974)

Eileen Cecilia Collinge was born in Dublin, Ireland to F. Channon Collinge and Emmie (née Russell) Collinge. Patricia Collinge was educated first by a visiting governess and then at a girls’ school. She took dancing and piano lessons none of which interested her. She finally settled on being an actress. She made her first stage […]

Stafford Repp (1918 - 1974)

Born and raised in California, Stafford Repp was educated at Lowell High School, in San Francisco, California. Soon after the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, Repp served a stint in the United States Army Air Corps during World War II. After military service, he began his acting career in mid-life. He was first […]

Bobby Buntrock (1952 - 1974)

Bobby Buntrock was born in Denver, Colorado, to Robert and Maxine Buntrock. He had a younger sister, Stella. When he was three, the family moved to Whittier, California, where neighbors urged Buntrock’s parents to get their son into acting. After submitting Buntrock’s picture to various agents, he was signed by Marcella Bell. Shortly after signing […]

Candy Darling (1944 - 1974)

Candy Darling was born James Lawrence Slattery in Forest Hills, Queens, the child of Theresa (née Phelan 1911–2014), a bookkeeper at Manhattan’s Jockey Club, and James “Jim” Slattery, who was described as a violent alcoholic. There is controversy surrounding the year of birth. According to former Warhol associate, Bob Colacello, Darling was born in 1946, while […]

Otto Kruger (1885 - 1974)

Otto Kruger was of German descent. He was the grandnephew of South African pioneer and president Paul Kruger. Otto was musically trained, but switched careers and became an actor. He studied briefly at Columbia University. Making his Broadway debut at the age of fifteen, Kruger quickly became a matinee idol. Though he started to get noticed in […]

Anna Q. Nilsson (1888 - 1974)

Anna Q. Nilsson was born in Ystad, Skåne County, Sweden in 1888. Her middle name, “Quirentia ” is derived from her date of birth, March 30 Saint Quirinius’ Day. When she was 8 years old her father got a job at the local sugar factory in Hasslarp, a small community outside Helsingborg in Sweden where […]

Chubby Johnson (1903 - 1974)

Charles “Chubby” Johnson (August 13, 1903 – October 31, 1974) was an American film and television supporting character actor with a genial demeanor and warm country-accented voice perfect for westerns. A native of Terre Haute, Indiana, Johnson was a journalist and radio announcer before he entered film and television when he was past forty years of […]

Barbara Ruick (1930 - 1974)

Barbara Ruick was the daughter of actors Lurene Tuttle and Melville Ruick. She grew up acting out scenes with dolls, employing her mother as an audience. She attended Roosevelt High School, Burbank High School in Burbank, and North Hollywood High School. She did little acting in high school but joined a school band at the […]

Sara Berner (1912 - 1969)

Born Lillian Herdan in Albany, New York, the first of the five children of Sam Herdan and Sarah Herdan (née Berner), Sara Berner was a drama student at University of Tulsa for two years. Described as having “an extensive knowledge of dialects,” Berner was also active as a radio and cartoon voice talent, working primarily with […]

Mari Blanchard (1927 - 1970)

Mari Blanchard was born on April 13, 1927 in Long Beach, California. A polio victim at age 9, Blanchard’s health eventually improved enough that she ran away from home and joined a circus in her teens. She then attended the University of Southern California, getting her degree. In the late 1940s, Blanchard became a successful print […]

Georgine Darcy (1931 - 2004)

Georgine Darcy (January 14, 1931 – July 18, 2004) was an American dancer and actress best known for her role as “Miss Torso” in the 1954 Alfred Hitchcock film Rear Window. She also had a regular role in the 1960–1961 ABC sitcom Harrigan and Son. Born in Brooklyn, Darcy’s mother urged her to become a stripper […]

Judith Evelyn (1909 - 1967)

Judith Evelyn (March 20, 1909 – May 7, 1967) was an American stage and film actress who appeared in as many as fifty films and television series. She was born Evelyn Morris in Seneca, South Dakota. All of the four plays were made into films, but Evelyn did not appear in any of them. She did […]

Patricia Cutts (1926 - 1974)

Born in London, Patricia Cutts was the daughter of the writer-director Graham Cutts. Her first roles were small parts in American films such as I Was a Male War Bride and The Man Who Loved Redheads and the television shows Alfred Hitchcock Presents and Perry Mason, where she played defendant Sylvia Oxman in the 1959 […]

Betty Compson (1897 - 1974)

Compson began in silents with her first film in November 1915. She made 41 films in 1916 alone, although all of them were shorts for Al Christie with the exception of one feature Almost a Widow. She continued this pace of making numerous short films well into the middle of 1918 when after a long […]

Mark Frechette (1947 - 1975)

Mark Frechette (December 4, 1947 – September 27, 1975) was an American film actor. He is best known for his lead role in the 1970 film Zabriskie Point, directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, in which he was cast despite his lack of previous acting experience. He appeared in two other films made in Italy and Yugoslavia, Many […]

Michel Simon (1895 - 1975)

Michel Simon used to say about himself that he was born in 1895 and, “as misfortune never comes singly, cinema was born the same year”. Son of a Protestant sausage maker, Simon soon left his family and town to go to Paris, where he first lived at the Hotel Renaissance, Saint-Martin Street, then in Montmartre. He […]