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Nick Adams (actor, born 1931)

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For other uses, see Nick Adams (actor, born 1931) (disambiguation).
Nick Adams
File:Nickadamsrebel.jpg
Nick Adams in a publicity photo for his US television series The Rebel, circa 1960.
Born
Nicholas Aloysius Adamshock
SpouseCarol Nugent

Nick Adams born Nicholas Aloysius Adamshock (July 10, 1931, Nanticoke, Pennsylvania -- February 7, 1968, Hollywood, California), was an American actor.

Biography

Early life

The son of a Ukrainian[1] anthracite coal miner in a small city near Wilkes-Barre in Northeastern Pennsylvania, Adams' family moved to New Jersey in his youth at age 5.

"My father piled all our belongings into an old jalopy, with our bedding on top. We didn't know where we were going. He started driving, and ran out of gas and money in Jersey at Audubon Park. A man came over and started talking to us, a Mr. Cohn. He said to my father 'You look like you need a job,' and my father said 'I do'."

He is said to have made money as a teenager by hustling pool games and working as a bat boy for a local baseball team. He was later offered a playing position in minor league baseball but turned it down because he was uninterested in the low pay.

Hollywood career and personal friendships with stars

While trying to get a role in the play Mister Roberts in New York he had a brief encounter with Henry Fonda, who advised him to get some training as an actor. Eventually hitchhiking to Los Angeles he worked at various jobs (and was reportedly fired from one as a theater usher after putting his name on display as a publicity stunt). After serving in the United States Coast Guard, following much persistence and creativity Adams appeared in the 1955 film version of Mister Roberts. In Rebel Without a Cause (1955), starring James Dean, Natalie Wood and Sal Mineo, Adams had a supporting role, reportedly gaining a reputation as both a prankster and a scene-stealer on the set. According to Elaine Dundy, he himself stated, "I was a friend of James Dean."[1] One of Nick Adams's letters shows how close he was to the Hollywood star. Adams writes: "I think you're wonderful for thinking so much of Jimmy [i.e. James Dean]. I've just written a story about him in the Sept. issue of Screen Stars. ... He was the most wonderful, kindest guy in the whole world. The article about Jimmy and Vampira was not true. Jimmy smoked Viceroys most of the time. I'm enclosing a picture of Jimmy from a scene in 'Giant.' I wish I could send you something of his but I only have a few things of his and I would never part with them."[2] Following the death of James Dean, Adams became one of the actors used to promote Rebel Without a Cause for the studio and for a time dated co-star Natalie Wood.

Adams made another appearance in the widely popular film adaptation of Picnic (1955) which was mostly filmed on location in Kansas. He was not perceived by casting directors as tall or handsome enough for leading roles but during the late 1950s he had supporting roles in several successful films, such as No Time for Sergeants (1958).

Nick Adams' friendship with Elvis Presley and members of his so-called Memphis Mafia, widely publicized at the time, began in 1956. In his book Last Train to Memphis, American popular music historian Peter Guralnick says on page 328 about Elvis Presley: "On his second day of filming on the set of Love Me Tender he met twenty-five-year-old Nick Adams, a Hollywood hustler who had originally brazened his way into the cast of Mister Roberts two years before by doing impressions of the star, Jimmy Cagney, for director John Ford." When Presley had completed his first film in Hollywood and was about to perform a large outdoor show in Tupelo, Mississippi, he "arrived on his Harley Davidson motorcycle with Nick Adams."[3] Guralnick says that at the time Nick Adams was Dennis Hopper's roommate and when Presley's filming sessions were over the three of them hung out together. According to Elaine Dundy, "Of all Elvis' new friends, Nick Adams, by background and temperament the most insecure, was also his closest."[4] In an interview, Memphis Mafia member Red West confirms that Adams "was a friend of Elvis’s and I went to Hollywood and met him. He helped me get into the first door and then Robert Conrad who did Hawaiian Eye and Wild Wild West, we played football every Sunday when Elvis got back and all those people would come out..."[5] Guralnick emphasizes that Presley "was hanging out more and more with Nick and his friends" and that Elvis was glad that his manager Colonel Tom Parker "liked Nick."[6] During the first year of their friendship, Presley showed Adams Memphis and other places which were important to the singer, for instance, Humes and "the Tiplers at Crown Electric,"[7] According to Guaralnick, in Hollywood, it "was good running around with Nick ... – there was always something happening, and the hotel suite was like a private clubhouse where you needed to know the secret password to get in and he got to change the password every day."[8] Presley's girlfriend June Juanico lamented that during their dates the singer was always talking about his friend Adams. "He started telling her all about Nick and Nick's friends and Jimmy Dean, but she didn't want to hear."[9] In May 1957 Adams even published a charming account of his friendship with Elvis.[10]. In a letter of August 25, 1958, shortly after Elvis's mother Gladys passed away, Presley's manager Colonel Parker wrote that "Nicky Admas [sic] came out to be with Elvis last Week wich [sic] was so very kind of him to be there with his friend."[11]

In her 1985 book Elvis and Gladys Elaine Dundy made some critical remarks about Colonel Tom Parker's role concerning Adams's friendship with Presley. She wrote that when Presley arrived in Hollywood to make his first film in 1956 he was encouraged by studio executives to be seen with some of the "hip" new young actors there. However, Parker became concerned Elvis' new Hollywood acquaintances might influence his rising superstar and even tell Presley what they were paying for manager/agent's fees (which was usually a fraction of what Parker was getting). Dundy wrote (on p. 250) that Adams was a

...brash struggling young actor whose main scheme to further his career was to hitch his wagon to a star, the first being James Dean, about whose friendship he was noisily boastful... this made it easy for Parker to suggest that Nick be invited to join Elvis' growing entourage of paid companions, and for Nick to accept... following Adams' hiring, there appeared a newspaper item stating that Nick and Parker were writing a book on Elvis together.

Dundy called Colonel Parker a master manipulator who used Nick Adams and others in the entourage (including Parker's own brother-in-law Bitsy Mott) to counter possible subversion against him and keep a check on Elvis' movements.

In 1959, Nick Adams starred in the television series The Rebel, playing the character Johnny Yuma, an ex-confederate, journal-keeping "trouble-shooter" in the old American west, which ran on ABC. Though credited as a co-creator of The Rebel, Adams had no role in writing the pilot or any of the series' episodes. The show's creator, Andrew J. Fenady, wrote the pilot episode after his friend, Adams, urged him to create a starring vehicle for him. Close friend Red West got his first stunt performer work on Adams television show and went on to a very successful career in Hollywood. After the series was cancelled in 1961 Adams went back to film work, along with a role in the short-lived television series Saints and Sinners.

File:YoungDillengerCast.jpg
Helen Stephens, Dan Terranova, Beverly Powers, Robert Conrad, Nick Adams, Mary Ann Mobley, John Ashley and Joy Harmon on the set of Young Dillinger (1965)

He was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in the film Twilight of Honor (1963). He campaigned heavily for the award, spending over $8,000 on ads in trade magazines but many of his strongest scenes had been cut from the movie and he lost to Melvyn Douglas. During this period, Adams appeared as a guest panelist on the CBS-TV quiz program, What's My Line.

He later became very close friends with actor Harvey Gardner after shooting an episode of The Outer Limits with him in 1964.

Declining career

By 1964 his career seems to have stalled. He had high hopes his performance in Young Dillinger (with Robert Conrad) would be critically acclaimed but the project had low production values and both critics and audiences rejected the film. In 1965, Adams was forced to accept parts in Japanese B-movies. He landed major roles in two science fiction epics from Toho Studios in Chiyoda, Tokyo. The first was the sixth Godzilla film, titled Invasion of Astro-Monster, in which he played Astronaut Glenn, journeying to the newly discovered Planet X. In Frankenstein Conquers the World Adams played the role of Dr. Bowen. In both film plots, his character had a love interest with characters portrayed by actress Kumi Mizuno and the two reportedly had an off-screen relationship.

Personal life

Adams' spectacular life and death at a young age, his friendships with megastars such as James Dean (a cultural icon who also died tragically young) and Elvis Presley and his reported drug consumption have made his private life the subject of various reports even decades later.

Marriage, children and conflicts with his wife

His marriage to former child actor Carol Nugent, who had also appeared in an episode of The Rebel, produced two children (Allyson Lee Adams in 1960 and Jeb Stewart Adams in 1962, both of whom later pursued acting careers). Sometimes acrimonious marital problems reportedly interfered with his ability to get lucrative acting parts after 1963.

According to Peter L. Winkler[12], Adams "shocked audiences by announcing that he was leaving his wife" while appearing on 'The Les Crane Show' to plug Young Dillinger early in 1965. "After that announcement, Nick's career and personal life went into a tragic free fall. Nick and Carol publicly announced a reconciliation a week later," on January 19, 1965. This was reported by several newspapers, such as the Los Angeles Times and the Los Angeles Herald Examiner. "At the end of July 1965, they decided on a legal separation. Carol filed for divorce in September. Nick was still in Japan when Carol was granted a divorce and custody of the children on Oct. 12. On Jan. 26, 1966, Nick and Carol announced another reconciliation on a local television show, 'Bill John's Hollywood Star Notebook.' It wouldn't last. ... On Nov. 26, 1966, Carol resumed divorce proceedings and obtained a restraining order against Nick. Carol alleged that Nick was 'prone to fits of temper' and in a special affidavit charged that Nick had 'choked her, struck her and threatened to kill her during the past few weeks.' ... It was the beginning of an acrimonious, contested divorce and child-custody battle." ... On January 20, 1967, "while waiting for a court hearing to begin, Nick was served with an $110,000 defamation suit" by his wife's boyfriend. However, on January 31, "Nick won temporary custody of his children. It was a hollow victory in his tug of war with his wife." His son "Jeb Adams said, 'He saw it as a competition, basically, more than anything of getting custody of us. But, a matter of a week or two later, he gave us back to my mom.'" Adams's wife "later regained legal custody of her children." However, as Carol Adams is listed as Nick Adams's spouse on his death certificate, it is evident that the divorce had not become final when the actor died.

Nick Adams' sexuality

Adams's sexuality is a matter of debate. Long after his death, some biographers and writers claimed Adams may have been gay or bisexual and may have had relationships with actor James Dean and singer Elvis Presley. In his 1986 gossip book Conversations With My Elders, chronicler of gay Hollywood Boze Hadleigh said that actor Sal Mineo told him in 1972: "I didn't hear it from Jimmy (James Dean), who was sort of awesome to me when we did Rebel. But Nick told me they had a big affair." William Russo says that "Rumors began to spread that Adams was closer to Dean than a nicotine stain, something he was eager to exploit if it meant additional successes. ... Adams was so obsessed with Dean that he could imitate the voice of the Master."[13] In his book, Elvis (1981), Albert Goldman wrote that "Nick Adams ingratiated himself with James Dean precisely as he would do a year or so later with Elvis. He offered himself to the shy, emotionally contorted and rebellious Dean, as a friend, a guide, a boon companion, a homosexual lover--whatever role or service Dean required." In his 2004 biography Natalie Wood: A Life, biographer, screenwriter and Hollywood chronicler Gavin Lambert, who was a member of the gay Hollywood circles of the 1950s and 1960s, wrote in passing (p. 199) that Wood's "first studio-arranged date with a gay or bisexual actor had been with Nick Adams." According to Hollywood biographer Lawrence J. Quirk, Mike Connolly, gay gossip columnist for the Hollywood Reporter from 1951 to 1966, whose homosexuality was widely known in Hollywood, "would put the make on the most prominent young actors, including Robert Francis, Guy Madison, Anthony Perkins, Nick Adams, and James Dean. Quirk said there was rampant gossip at gay parties regarding not only Connolly's escapades with these actors but also a noteworthy pornography collection he would display to those he favored."[14] Some authors called Adams a "Hollywood hustler" or a "street hustler" (although Adams called himself a pool hustler). Leigh W. Rutledge, for instance, writes that James Dean "claimed to have worked, with his friend Nick Adams, as a street hustler after he first arrived in Hollywood."[15] In her autobiography Miss Rona (1974), Rona Barrett says Adams "had become the companion to a group of salacious homosexuals." According to Byron Raphael and reputed Elvis biographer Alanna Nash, Nick Adams may have "swung both ways" as "Adams’s good pal (and Elvis’s idol) James Dean. Tongues wagged that Elvis and Adams were getting it on."[16] Similar claims about the close relationship between Presley and Adams can be found in books by Earl Greenwood and David Bret and in statements by Nick Adams's secretary, Bill Dakota.[17]

However, Adams was known in Hollywood for embellishing and inventing stories about his show business experiences and had long tried to capitalize on his associations with James Dean and Elvis Presley. In his brief online biography of Adams, journalist Bill Kelly wrote, "(Adams) became James Dean's closest pal, although Nick was straight and Dean was bisexual." Furthermore, there are no court documents or personal letters from Adams or statements by alleged male lovers which undoubtedly prove that Adams was gay. On the other hand, being outed as homosexual at that time could instantly end an actor's career. Thus most gay and lesbian actors in America were forced to keep their sexuality a secret and lead double lives.

Adams's off-screen dates with actresses

Adams regularly dated actresses with whom he made movies. It is not known if he had much sexual interest in them or if he primarily dated them for publicity reasons. According to Gavin Lambert, Natalie Wood's first date with Adams was studio-arranged. Modern Screen writes that "their relationship has been mostly for fun" and that they shared "a tendency toward moodiness and unpredictability." The magazine also reports that they had given joint interviews "in which they admitted they adored each other" and that "they even came terribly close to getting married" in Las Vegas. On the other hand, the same article also reveals that on one of their trips they "posed for innumerable publicity photographs - that was the real reason for the trip - " and that "Right now, both Nick and Natalie are inclined to deny the whole Las Vegas episode." Olive Sturgess relates: "When Nick and I went out, it was a casual thing – no great love or anything like that. ... I thought he was very troubled ... You could feel he was troubled. It was the manner he had – that was the way he was in real life, always brooding. ... When we went out, it was never on his motorcycle! That's one trick he couldn't pull on me. We always went in a car!" [18] In Japan, Adams and actress Kumi Mizuno may have had a short affair. "That's one of the reasons my parents were divorced," says Adams' daughter, playwright Allyson Lee Adams. "My dad had a penchant for becoming infatuated with his leading ladies. It was a way for him to take on the role he was playing at the time."[19]

Death

Adams wears an off-the-shelf motorcycle helmet in Mission Mars (1968) shortly before his death.

Adams' career seemed to be on the verge of an upswing when on the night of Feb 7, 1968 his lawyer and friend Erwin Roeder drove to the actor's house at 2126 El Roble Lane in Beverly Hills to check on him after a missed dinner appointment. Seeing a light on and his car in the garage Roeder broke through a window and discovered Adams in his upstairs bedroom, slumped against a wall and wearing a shirt, blue jeans and boots, his eyes open in a blank stare, dead. He was 36. During the autopsy Dr. Thomas Noguchi found enough paraldehyde, sedatives and other drugs in the body "to cause instant unconsciousness." The death certificate lists "paraldehyde and promazine intoxication" as the immediate cause of death, with the notation accident; suicide; undetermined. Note that the American Medical Association warns never to take these two types of drugs together. In the 1960s, such warnings were not known about as they are today. His remains were buried in Berwick, Pennsylvania.

Adams' death has been cited in articles and books on Hollywood's unsolved mysteries along with allegations that Adams was murdered, including claims that no trace of the liquid sedative paraldehyde (one of two drugs Adams died from) was ever found in his home, but a story in The Los Angeles Times reported that stoppered bottles with prescription labels were found in the medicine cabinet near the upstairs bedroom where Adams' body was discovered. However, the actor's daughter Allyson Adams still "believes her father may have been killed. She says Adams had just returned from making a film in Mexico and was working out (he was an avid weight lifter) for another Hollywood comeback, and that the coroner's office changed the official cause of death from 'natural causes' to 'homicide' before finally ruling it suicide."[20] On the other hand, Actor Robert Conrad (his best friend) has consistently maintained Adams' death was accidental. Some people have pointed out the fact that Adams died shortly before Elvis Presley filmed his Memphis Comeback concert.

Quotes

I dreamed all my life of being a movie star. Movies were my life.
You had to have an escape when you were raised in a basement.
I saw all the James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart and John Garfield
pictures. Odds against the world... that was my meat.

I will never make a picture abroad.

(1963, 2 years before Adams did so.)

Trivia

  • Adams, who had a talent for voice impersonations, overdubbed some of James Dean's lines for the film Giant after Dean died during production.
  • Following Dean's death, Adam's tried to capitalize on his friend's fame through various publicity stunts, including a claim he was being stalked by a crazed female Dean fan. He also claimed to have developed Dean's affection for fast cars, later telling a reporter, "I became a highway delinquent. I was arrested nine times in one year. They put me on probation, but I kept on racing... nowhere." However, the offers for light comedy roles continued.
  • The theme song for The Rebel was recorded by Johnny Cash, who made it a hit.
  • Adams is reported to have consulted with John Wayne for tips on how to play his role in The Rebel.
  • He is one of four actors typically named in connection with the Rebel Without a Cause Curse, a widely repeated urban legend.
  • Working at Toho Studios, Adams was very well respected by the other actors, who still remember him as a "team player." Some examples:
    • On the set of Monster Zero, Adams and co-star Yoshio Tsuchiya (who played the villainous Controller of Planet X) got along so well during production that the two actors played jokes on each other. One morning, Adams asked Tsuchiya how to say "good morning" in Japanese, and taught him how to say, "I'm hungry." (Adams was on a strict diet at the time and nearly fainted during filming.) Later, when shooting a scene, Adams got even by saying to Tsuchiya, in Japanese, "You're overacting!" Before leaving Toho, Adams wanted a picture of Tsuchiya, who at first thought he was just flattering him, but he wanted something to remember him by. Tsuchiya was touched by this.
    • Before leaving Toho, Adams gave one of his formal wears to Akira Kubo (who co-starred in Monster Zero as the meek inventor Tetsuo Torî), not just as a memento, but, according to Kubo, "the suit fit me."

Notes

  1. ^ Elaine Dundy, Elvis and Gladys (University Press of Mississippi, 2004), p.260
  2. ^ See Nick Adams's letter to a certain Caroline.
  3. ^ Robert W. Dye, The Mid-south Fair, (Tn): Celebrating 150 Years (2006), p.114.
  4. ^ Elaine Dundy, Elvis and Gladys, p.250.
  5. ^ See RED WEST INTERVIEW.
  6. ^ Guralnick, Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley, p.336, 339.
  7. ^ Guralnick, Last Train to Memphis, p.339-340.
  8. ^ Guralnick, Last Train to Memphis, p.410.
  9. ^ Guralnick, Last Train to Memphis, p.347-348.
  10. ^ Cited in Guralnick, Last Train to Memphis.
  11. ^ See Trude Forsher Archive, Letter of Authenticity from Mrs. Forsher's son. From 1956-1961, Trude Forsher was Elvis Presley and Colonel Tom Parker's personal secretary. Her vast collection of Elvis memorabilia remained with her family for almost 50 years.
  12. ^ Peter L. Winkler, "Nick Adams: His Hollywood Life and Death", Crime Magazine, August 15, 2003, originally published in Filmfax magazine.
  13. ^ William Russo, The Next James Dean (2004), p.135.
  14. ^ See Val Holley, Mike Connolly and the Manly Art of Hollywood Gossip (2003), p.22.
  15. ^ Leigh W. Rutledge, The Gay Book of Lists (2003), p.27.
  16. ^ Byron Raphael with Alanna Nash, "In Bed with Elvis," Playboy, November 2005, Vol. 52, Iss. 11.
  17. ^ See, for example, Bill Dakota, "Elvis was bisexual. Nick Adams was one of his secret, closeted, lovers."
  18. ^ Michael G. Fitzgerald and Boyd Magers, Ladies of the Western: Interviews with Fifty-One More Actresses from the Silent Era to the Television Westerns of the 1950s and 1960s (2002), p.266.
  19. ^ Steve Ryfle, Japan's Favorite Mon-Star: The Unauthorized Biography of "The Big G.", p.130.
  20. ^ Ryfle, p.130.

Filmography

As an actor

As a writer

As himself

External links

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