Richard Widmark

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Richard Widmark (1991)

Richard Widmark (born December 26, 1914 in Sunrise Township , Chisago County , Minnesota , † March 24, 2008 in Roxbury , Connecticut ) was an American actor . In the course of his decades-long career, he has appeared in over 75 films.

Life

Richard Widmark was born the son of the Swedish immigrant and sales representative Carl Henry Widmark and his wife Ethel Mae Barr in Sunrise Township ( Chisago County ). The family soon moved to Sioux Falls . Widmark could read before he went to school, and after graduating from high school, studied law to become a lawyer. He also got enthusiastic about acting from an early age.

In 1938 Widmark moved to New York with his future wife, Jean Hazlewood , a screenwriter he had met as a colleague in Lake Forrest , and married them on April 5, 1942. In 1945 their only child, Anne Heath Widmark, was born.

In 1943 Widmark made his Broadway debut in George Abbott's theater production Kiss and Tell . Widmark worked as a radio announcer for ten years before making his film debut in Henry Hathaway's The Kiss of Death in 1947 . He played a criminal who, in the most famous scene in the film, cold-heartedly pushes a paraplegic woman down the stairs in her wheelchair. The Film Noir - Thriller was suddenly announced at the box office and with critics a great success and made the actor. He won the first ever Golden Globe Award for Best Young Actor and was nominated for an Oscar . In the 20th Century Fox Widmark received a seven-year contract.

After his successful debut, Widmark was initially committed to the role of the villain for years. It was only in the 1950s that the actor managed to get away from this cliché and establish himself as a versatile leading actor in all genres. He developed a wide range of roles and appeared in war films ( Frogmen , 1951) or adventure films ( Through the Yellow Hell , 1952). Widmark achieved particular popularity in numerous western films of the 1950s and 1960s ( The Broken Lance , 1954, Warlock , 1959, Alamo , 1960, Two Rode Together , 1961, Cheyenne , 1964, Alvarez Kelly , 1966 ).

Over the years, Widmark became a sought-after character actor who also appeared in dramatic films such as The Judgment of Nuremberg (1961), in which he was seen as the accuser of Nazi criminals. He starred in police films ( Police Intervene , 1953, Only 72 Hours , 1968), disaster films ( Roller Coaster , 1977) and thrillers ( The Ultimatum , 1977, Bear Island in Hell of the Arctic , 1979). Although he usually portrayed characters with positive connotations, Widmark was repeatedly seen as a villain. In the star-studded Agatha Christie film, Murder on the Orient Express (1974), he acted as an unscrupulous child kidnapper.

Richard Widmark was one of the most sought-after actors in Hollywood for a good three decades and starred in numerous hit movies until the late 1970s. From the 1980s onwards, due to age, things became a little quieter for the distinguished actor. In 1987 he appeared in Volker Schlöndorff's film Ein Aufstand alten Männer (based on the novel A Gathering of Old Men by Ernest J. Gaines ). In 1991 Richard Widmark stood in front of the film camera for the last time in the political thriller The Price of Power .

Widmark spent the rest of his life secluded on his Connecticut farm. The avowed horse lover was little interested in Hollywood's glitz and glamor world. Widmark's wife, Jean, died in 1997 after 55 years of marriage from complications from Alzheimer's disease . After her death, he married Susan Blanchard in September 1999 , who had previously been married to Henry Fonda .

Richard Widmark died after a long and serious illness in March 2008 on his country estate in Roxbury, Connecticut. He was 93 years old.

Awards

In 1948, he won a Golden Globe for Best Young Actor.

In 2005 he received the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Career Achievement Award for Lifetime Achievement; he was also honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame .

Others

Although Widmark owes his career in large part to depicting violent characters, he hated guns and spoke out against liberal gun laws in the United States .

In 1956, Widmark and Marilyn Monroe graced the title of the German first edition of Bravo .

Dubbing voices from Widmark were u. a. Arnold Marquis , Heinz Drache and Ernst Wilhelm Borchert .

Filmography

watch TV

  • 1971: Vanished , directed by Buzz Kulik
  • 1972/73: Madigan , 6-part series; Director: Alex March u. Boris Sagal ; German Sergeant Madigan , 1975
  • 1973: Brock's Last Case , directed by David Lowell Rich; German Brock's last case , 1987
  • 1974: Benjamin Franklin , 4-part television film, director: Glenn Jordan. Widmark plays the rebel Franklin in the turmoil of the American Revolution.
  • 1975: The Last Day , directed by Vincent McEveety ; German The Last Ride of the Daltons , 1980
  • 1979: Mr. Horn , directed by Jack Starrett; German Scouts , 1989 / Austria: Mister Horn - His way to the gallows , 1992 (video only)
  • 1980: All God's Children , directed by Jerry Thorpe; dt. We are all God's children , 1986
  • 1981: A Whale for the Killing , directed by Richard T. Heffron; German The Stranger and the Whale , 1983
  • 1985: Blackout , directed by Douglas Hickox; dt. Blackout - beast in black
  • 1988: Once Upon a Texas Train , directed by Burt Kennedy ; German The Magnificent Nine , 1993
  • 1989: Cold Sassy Tree , directed by Joan Tewkesbury; German scandal in Cold Sassy , 1994
  • 1992: Lincoln , documentary by Peter W. Kunhardt. Widmark casts Ward Hill Lamon, Abraham Lincoln's friend and bodyguard .

Web links

Commons : Richard Widmark  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hollywood star Widmark dies: He hated guns - and became world famous as a western actor . Spiegel Online, news from March 27, 2008.
personal data
SURNAME Widmark, Richard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION US-American actor
DATE OF BIRTH December 26, 1914
PLACE OF BIRTH Sunrise , Minnesota, USA
DATE OF DEATH March 24, 2008
Place of death Roxbury , Connecticut, USA