Burgess Meredith

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Burgess Meredith (1938)

Oliver Burgess Meredith (born November 16, 1907 in Cleveland , Ohio , † September 9, 1997 in Malibu , California ) was an American actor , director and writer . In the course of his over 60-year acting career, he had numerous successes in film, television and theater.

biography

Oliver Burgess Meredith was born to the American Ida Beth, née Burgess, and the Canadian doctor William George Meredith. He graduated from Hoosac School in Hoosick Falls in 1926 and graduated from Amherst College in 1931 . In 1930 Meredith made his Broadway debut in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet as Peter. In 1933 Meredith became a member of Eva Le Gallienne's theater company Civic Repertory Theater in New York City . In 1935 he had his breakthrough on Broadway in the hit piece The Barretts of Wimpole Street on the side of Katharine Cornell , with whom he also played in other plays. For the next several decades, Meredith appeared on Broadway in a wide variety of theater roles. Meredith starred in plays by Shakespeare, O'Neill, Beckett, and other writers. He became a member of the legendary Actors Studio by invitation.

In his film debut, the drama A Charming Villain (1935), Meredith only had a minor supporting role; but already in his next film Winterset (1936) he was allowed to play the leading role. However, he did not make the breakthrough to become a great Hollywood star, mostly he had to be content with supporting roles in larger film projects, while he also took on leading roles more often in B films. In 1939, directed by Lewis Milestone , he played the role of ranch worker George Milton in the critically acclaimed literary adaptation Of Mice and People, based on the novel by John Steinbeck . During World War II , he served in the United States Army Air Forces and achieved the rank of captain. He was fired in 1944 to play the famous war reporter Ernie Pyle in the war film The Story of GI Joe . His Hollywood career came to an abrupt end when he was suspected of communism during the McCarthy era in the early 1950s and was placed on one of the notorious black lists. In the following years he had to switch to theater and television work.

He has received multiple nominations and awards for his television roles, including an Emmy nomination for Hallmark Hall of Fame and an Emmy award for Tail Gunner Joe . In the television series Batman , he played the role of the villain penguin in 21 episodes between 1966 and 1968, as well as in the feature film Batman Keeps the World in Breath . A return to the big screen was made possible for Meredith in the 1960s not least by director Otto Preminger , who cast him in films such as the political drama Storm over Washington and the war epic First Victory . In his late career, Meredith was nominated twice for Best Supporting Actor for an Oscar : At the 1976 Academy Awards , he received the nomination for his portrayal of the dead and terminally ill actor Harry Greener in the film drama The Day of the Locust , at the 1977 award ceremony for his character the coach Mickey Goldmill alongside Sylvester Stallone in the hit film Rocky . He played the latter role in the sequels Rocky II , Rocky III - Eye of the Tiger and Rocky V . Since Mickey dies in the middle of the third film, archive footage was filmed for Rocky IV - The Fight of the Century and flashbacks for Rocky V , while for the sixth part Rocky Balboa again, due to the death of Meredith, archive footage was used.

One of his last roles was great-grandfather Gustavson in the movie Crazy Couple and the sequel Third Spring - Friends, Enemies, Fish & Women , in which he plays the father of Jack Lemmon . For these two appearances he received great critical acclaim. In addition to his acting, Meredith has also repeatedly worked as a writer and director. He wrote several plays and was awarded a Tony Award for his production of A Thurber Carnival together with James Thurber in 1960 . As a film director, he directed The Man on the Eiffel Tower (1949) with Charles Laughton in the lead role and the fantasy film The Yin and the Yang of Mr. Go (1970) with James Mason .

On September 9, 1997, Meredith died two months before his 90th birthday of complications from Alzheimer's disease and black skin cancer . He was married four times. The marriages with Helen Derby Berrien (1932-1935), the actress Margaret Perry (1936-1938) and Paulette Goddard (1944-1949) remained childless, while he was with his last wife Kaja Sundsten, with whom he was from 1951 until his death Married in 1997 with two children. In 1994 he had his autobiography So Far, So Good. released. In obituaries, the award-winning Meredith was praised, among other things, as a “virtuoso actor” who credibly portrayed both kind-hearted characters and villains with apparent simplicity.

His German dubbing voice was lent to him by Hans Hessling , among others in Rocky and Rocky II and Friedrich W. Bauschulte , as in Battle of the Titans .

There were at Max Factor color name for a make-up primer called "Burgess Meredith." It is claimed that Max Factor composed this color for the extraordinary complexion of Burgess Meredith and then added it to the range.

Filmography (selection)

Meredith (left) as the penguin , along with Frank Gorshin as Riddler and Cesar Romero as Joker during the film Batman keeps the world in suspense .

TV Shows

Awards

literature

  • Burgess Meredith: So far, so good: a memoir. Little Brown & Co., Boston 1994, ISBN 978-0316567176 .

Web links

Commons : Burgess Meredith  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Burgess Meredith, 89, Who Was at Ease Playing Good Guys and Villains, Dies , The New York Times , September 11, 1997.
  2. ↑ Burgess Meredith obituary , CNN.com, September 10, 1997.
  3. ^ Burgess Meredith genealogy by Robert Battle, hosted at freepages.rootsweb
  4. ↑ TCM / AFI Notes: The Story of GI Joe . Turner Classic Movies / TCM.com. Retrieved September 16, 2011.
  5. ↑ http://www.nytimes.com/1997/09/11/movies/burgess-meredith-89-who-was-at-ease-playing-good-guys-and-villains-dies.html
personal data
SURNAME Meredith, Burgess
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Meredith, Oliver Burgess (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION US-American actor
DATE OF BIRTH November 16, 1907
PLACE OF BIRTH Cleveland , Ohio , United States
DATE OF DEATH September 9, 1997
Place of death Malibu , California , United States