Fade to Black: A Book of Movie Obituaries

by Paul Donnelley

  CAUSE: In August 1996 Hughie Green was diagnosed with cancer of the oesophagus. He died aged 77 of internal bleeding caused by the cancer at the Royal Marsden Hospital in London. Half of his ashes were scattered at Wemyss Bay on the Clyde in Scotland on August 6. Five days later, on August 11, the other half were scattered over Mount Royal, overlooking Montreal. He left £276,182, most of which came from the sale of his flat. At his funeral at Golders Green Crematorium, Hoop Lane, London on May 9, 1997 his drinking friend Noel Botham, a journalist, revealed that Green was the real father of a celebrated television personality. He did not identify the celebrity who, on December 11, 1997, turned out to be Paula Yates (b. Deganwy Castle, Colwyn Bay, Clwyd, Wales, April 24, 1959, d. St Luke’s Mews, Notting Hill, west London, September 17, 2000 from an overdose of heroin). Paula Yates’ funeral was held at the church of St Mary Magdalene in Faversham, Kent – the church where she had married the singer Bob Geldof (b. Dublin, Ireland, October 5, 1951) on August 24, 1986 and where their three children had been baptised. She was cremated at Charing Crematorium in Ashford, Kent.

  FURTHER READING: Opportunity Knocked – Hughie Green (London: Frederick Muller, 1965); Hughie And Paula The Tangled Lives Of Hughie Green And Paula Yates – Christopher Green with Carol Clerk (London: Robson Books, 2003).

  Nigel Green

  Born October 15, 1924

  Died May 15, 1972

  Imposing presence. Born in Pretoria, South Africa, Green was a regular face in the movies in the Fifties and Sixties although he never achieved stardom. His films include Stranger From Venus (1954), The Sea Shall Not Have Them (1954), As Long As They’re Happy as Peter, Reach For The Sky as Streatfield, Sword Of Sherwood Forest (1960) as Little John, Beat Girl (1960) as Simon, Pit Of Darkness (1961) as Jonathan, The Man At The Carlton Tower (1961) as Lew Daney, Mysterious Island (1961) as Tom, The Prince And The Pauper (1962), Doctor From Seven Dials (1962) as Inspector Donovan, Saturday Night Out (1963) as Paddy, Jason And The Argonauts (1963) as Hercules, The Masque Of The Red Death (1964) as Ludovico, Zulu (1964) as Colour Sergeant Bourne, The Ipcress File (1965) as Dalby, The Face Of Fu Manchu (1965) as Denis Nayland Smith, The Skull as Inspector Wilson, Let’s Kill Uncle (1966), Deadlier Than The Male as Carl Petersen, Khartoum as General Wolseley, Tobruk as Colonel Warren, Countess Dracula (1971) as Captain Dobi and Gawain And The Green Knight (1973) as the Green Knight.

  CAUSE: He died aged 47 in Brighton from an accidental overdose of sleeping pills.

  Sydney Greenstreet

  Born December 27, 1879

  Died January 18, 1954

  Villainous heavyweight. The movie career of 21-stone Sydney Hughes Greenstreet lasted just eight years, but featured some very memorable performances. Born in Sandwich, Kent, one of eight children, he tried a variety of jobs before opting for acting in 1902. He made the theatre his life until his film début aged 61 in The Maltese Falcon (1941) playing Kasper Gutman, for which he was nominated for an Oscar. Nicknamed Tiny, his other films included They Died With Their Boots On (1941) as Lieutenant General Winfield Scott, Casablanca (1942) as Senor Ferrari, Background To Danger (1943) as Colonel Robinson, Between Two Worlds (1944) as Thompson, The Mask Of Dimitrios as Mr Peters, Pillow To Post as Colonel Michael Otley, Three Strangers (1946) as Jerome K. Arbutny, Devotion (1946) as Thackeray, The Woman In White (1948) as Count Alessandro Fosco, Ruthless (1948) as Buck Mansfield and Flamingo Road (1949) as Sheriff Titus Semple, after which he retired from the cinema.

  CAUSE: He died in Hollywood, California, aged 74 from the effects of diabetes and Bright’s Disease. He was buried in Forest Lawn Memorial-Parks, 1712 South Glendale Avenue, Glendale, California 91209.

  Jane Greer

  Born September 9, 1924

  Died August 24, 2001

  Film noir’s seductive bad girl. Bettejane Greer was born along with her twin brother, Donne, in Washington, DC. At the age of 5 she went on the stage thanks to a starstruck mother. By the age of 12 she was a professional model although disaster struck three years later when she was afflicted with Bell’s Palsy which paralysed one side of her face and required intensive physiotherapy. By the time she was 17 5́ 5˝ Greer was being paid $100 a week singing with Ralph Hawkins’ band and performing rumbas and other Latin American songs with Enrico Madriguero’s Orchestra at the Del Rio nightclub in Washington. She couldn’t speak Spanish and learned the words phonetically: “Later I found out I was singing dirty lyrics.” In 1942, thanks to her mother who was working in the War Department, she modelled for an army recruiting poster, wearing a light khaki cotton twill uniform. When the picture was published in Life on June 8, 1942, she was soon approached by a number of Hollywood studios, and eventually summoned to California by Howard Hughes, who gave her money, ordered her not to go out with anyone, and then left her alone for six months. She later said, “Howard Hughes was obsessed with me. But at first it seemed as if he were offering me a superb career opportunity.” However, she found Hughes’ regime stifling and to escape began to sing on the crooner Rudy Vallee’s radio show. Hughes was not amused and absolutely furious when she married Rudy Vallee on December 2, 1943 in the Westwood Village Community Chapel, Los Angeles. However, Vallee was a serial adulterer and she soon issued divorce proceedings. The divorce came through in Los Angeles on July 27, 1944. They remained friendly, with Vallee commenting, “A more charming, talented and gracious person I shall never know.” Kirk Douglas later recalled, “Beautiful Jane could also be very funny. I loved hearing her stories of her brief marriage to Rudy Vallee at the age of 17 [sic], and how he would insist that she wear black panties, black net stockings and black shoes with heels so high she teetered.” The following year she made her film début in Pan-Americana (1945) as Miss Downing and then appeared in Dick Tracy (1945) as Judith Owens (the first time she was billed as Jane Greer). It was her role as Kathie Moffat in Out Of The Past (1947) that made her a poster girl for the film noir crowd. “I was believable,” she later recalled, “because although my character Kathie was a bitch, a liar and a killer, she looked soft and innocent.” The critic James Agee wrote, “Jane Greer can best be described, in an ancient idiom, as a hot number.” On August 21, 1947, she married lawyer-producer Edward Lasker, the son of a millionaire, and by him had three sons, Albert on June 23, 1948, Lawrence on October 7, 1949 and Steven on May 9, 1954, before their divorce in Juarez, Mexico, on November 6, 1963. She began making fewer and fewer films – 13 in 17 years because, “I didn’t want the children to grow up, and when asked what their mother did, say, ‘Oh, Mum’s a gun moll in the movies.’” The films included You’re In The Navy Now (1951), a comedy with Gary Cooper, The Company She Keeps (1951), You For Me (1952), The Prisoner Of Zenda (1952) and Desperate Search (1952). In Run For The Sun (1956) she caught a virus on location in the Mexican jungle and her marriage was beginning to fall apart. Jane Greer’s last lead role in a major film was her outstanding performance as the virtuous second wife of Lon Chaney (James Cagney) in Man Of A Thousand Faces (1958). Over the next two decades she took on smaller roles in films such as Where Love Has Gone (1964) which starred Susan Hayward and Bette Davis and was based on Lana Turner’s tempestuous romance with Johnny Stompanato. In 1983 she played the mother of Kathie Moffat (Rachel Ward) in Against All Odds, a disappointing remake of Out Of The Past. The only effect, wrote one critic, was to sully the image she had created in 1947. From 1963 until his death from lymphoma on January 31, 2001, she lived with the actor Frank London (b. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, November 21, 1924). Her nieces, 5˝ 8˝ 34D-27-34 Liza Jamie (b. El Paso, Colorado Springs, Colorado, August 31, 1963) and 5́ 8˝ Robin (b. Hollywood, California, May 27, 1960), brought shame to the family name when they wrote a best-selling book You’ll Never Make Love In This Town Again in which they regaled readers with their sexual exploits with some of Hollywood’s biggest names. Liza became a prostitute although Robin was a successful actress and from 1983 until 1985 she played Sydney Price on the ABC soap Ryan’s Hope. One of Robin’s closest friends was Nicole Brown S
impson (b. Frankfurt, West Germany, May 19, 1959, m. 875 South Bundy Drive, Beverly Hills, California, June 12, 1994, aged 35). Nicole’s daughter, Sydney (b. October 17, 1987) was named after her friend’s character.

  CAUSE: She died in Los Angeles, California, aged 76 of cancer.

  James Gregory

  Born December 23, 1911

  Died September 16, 2002

  The famous unknown actor. Born in the Bronx, he grew up in the New York suburb of La Rochelle. As a youngster, he demonstrated a talent for both acting and golf, being elected president of the school drama club, and he might have chosen a career in either. But his first proper employment, after a series of jobs as golf caddy, waiter and clerk, was on Wall Street. He had been offered a job after caddying for a stockbroker called John R. Dillon. He worked as a runner after the crash of October 1929 and within five years he had been promoted to the post of private secretary to a stockbroker. In his spare time Gregory simultaneously acted with local drama groups, and in 1935 he was acting professionally, performing with a travelling company in plays up and down the east coast of America. Then, in 1939, he made his Broadway début in a production of Key Largo. During the Second World War Gregory served in the US Navy and Marine Corps in the Pacific, spending 83 days on Okinawa. On his return to the stage, he appeared in a further 25 Broadway productions, including in 1948 Arthur Miller’s Death Of A Salesman, in which he played Biff. That same year he made his film début as Albert Hicks, a police patrolman in The Naked City. In the early Fifties Gregory moved into live television: “I once played five live shows on television within a period of 10 days. I set a record that’s never been beat. Can you imagine the running around I had to do in New York to make all the rehearsals and not get mixed up in the characterisations? I was lucky. Well, not only lucky, I was a good actor.” In 1954 he appeared in Danger, the first television show directed by John Frankenheimer. He then split his time between the stage and the big and small screens. He appeared in television dramas such as Gunsmoke, Bonanza, Wagon Train, and Rawhide. If an American cop was required on the television screen, the chances were that he would be embodied by James Gregory. He had roles in the very first episode of The Twilight Zone (October 2, 1959), Columbo, McCloud, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and Pentagon spy Jonathan Kaye in Cocoon, the September 20, 1968 pilot of the longest continuously running cop show on American television Hawaii Five-O. From April 16, 1959 to September 22, 1961, he was Barney Ruditsky in The Lawless Years, a series based on the exploits of a real detective in New York City in the 1920s. He also played Inspector Frank Luger from January 23, 1975 to September 9, 1982 in Barney Miller, about a Jewish policeman portrayed by Hal Linden. On the big screen his best-known role was probably as the right wing Senator Iselin in John Frankenheimer’s The Manchurian Candidate (1962), about a brainwashed Korean War hero. His other films included The Young Stranger (1957) as Sergeant Shipley, Al Capone (1959) as Schaefler, PT-109 (1963) as Commander C.R. Ritchie (the future President John F. Kennedy’s commanding officer), The Sons Of Katie Elder (1965) in which Gregory played Morgan Hastings, a murderer who kills the witnesses to his crimes, Beneath The Planet Of The Apes (1969) as Ursus, the gorilla commander who believes the only good human is a dead human and Shootout (1971) as Sam Foley. In 1944 he married Anne Miltner.

  CAUSE: Gregory retired to Arizona in 1986 after suffering two strokes. He died in Sedona aged 90.

  John Gregson

  Born March 15, 1919

  Died January 8, 1975

  Handsome British hero. Born in Liverpool, Gregson worked in amdram before appearing at the Liverpool Old Vic and moved into the cinema with Saraband For Dead Lovers (1948) and went on to appear in almost 40 films, including Scott Of The Antarctic (1948) as P.O. Green, London Belongs To Me (1948), Whisky Galore! (1949) as Sammy MacCodrun, Cairo Road (1950), Treasure Island (1950) as Redruth, The Lavender Hill Mob (1951) as Farrow, Venetian Bird (1952) as Renzo Uccello, The Titfield Thunderbolt (1953) as Gordon, Angels One Five (1953) as Pilot Officer ‘Septic’ Baird, To Dorothy A Son (1954) as Tony Rapallo, Above Us The Waves (1955) as Lieutenant Alec Duffy, The Battle Of The River Plate (1956) as Captain Bell, Rooney (1958) as James Ignatius Rooney, Hand In Hand (1960) as Father Timothy, The Treasure Of Monte Cristo (1961) as Renato, The Longest Day (1962) as the British vicar and Fright (1971) as Dr Cordell. Probably his best-loved film was the gentle British comedy Genevieve (1953), in which he portrayed veteran car racer Alan McKim. On the small screen he was known for the detective drama Gideon’s Way (1965) as Commander George Gideon. He was married to actress Thea Gregory and fathered six children.

  CAUSE: He died of a heart attack on holiday in Porlock Weir, Somerset, aged 55.

  Joyce Grenfell, OBE

  (JOYCE IRENE PHIPPS)

  Born February 10, 1910

  Died November 30, 1979

  Horsey comedienne. Born in London, the daughter of an American architect and the niece of Lady Nancy Astor, Grenfell was educated at Francis Holland School and then a Christian Science establishment before attending a finishing school in Paris. She began attending RADA but dropped out in 1929 to marry Reginald Grenfell. For three years from 1936 she was radio critic of the Observer. In 1939 she began her stage career with witty talks, entertaining monologues and silly songs. In 1946 she was made an OBE. She appeared in over 20 films, including A Letter From Home (1941), While The Sun Shines (1947) as Daphne, Stage Fright (1950), Laughter In Paradise (1951) as Elizabeth Robson, The Pickwick Papers (1952) as Mrs Leo Hunter, The Million Pound Note (1953) as the Duchess of Cromarty, Genevieve as the owner of a hotel, Forbidden Cargo (1954) as Lady Flavin Queensway, The Belles Of St Trinian’s as WPC Ruby Gates, Blue Murder At St Trinian’s (1957) as Sergeant Gates, The Good Companions (1957) as Lady Parlitt, The Pure Hell Of St Trinian’s (1961) as Sergeant Ruby Gates and The Yellow Rolls-Royce (1965) as Hortense Astor. In 1954 she toured the world with her show Joyce Grenfell Requests The Pleasure.

  CAUSE: She died of cancer at her London home, 34 Elm Park Gardens, Chelsea, aged 69, a month before she was due to become Dame Joyce Grenfell. She left £196,358.

  Lita Grey

  (LILLITA LOUISE MACMURRAY)

  Born April 15, 1908

  Died December 29, 1995

  Charlie’s darling. Born in Hollywood, California, the name of Lita Grey would be virtually forgotten – she made less than half a dozen films – if it was not for the fact that she married Charlie Chaplin. She first appeared in a Chaplin film when she was 12, playing in The Kid (1921). She played a maid in The Idle Class (1921). On March 2, 1924, now calling herself Lita Grey, she was signed as leading lady for Chaplin’s The Gold Rush (1925). On November 26, 1924, he married her at Guayamas, Mexico. Like his first wife she was 16 years old, but the second Mrs Chaplin was also pregnant by the time of the wedding. The union was to produce two sons: Charles Spencer, Jr (b. Los Angeles, California, May 5, 1925, d. California, March 20, 1968) and Sydney Earle (b. Los Angeles, California, March 30, 1926). Chaplin bribed an official to register his second son’s birth as June 28, 1925, to cover up his premarital sex. The Gold Rush was premièred at Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre on June 26, supposedly two days before the birth of Charles, Jr. The scenes featuring Grey were cut from the final edit. On January 10, 1927, Grey filed for divorce, which was granted on August 22, 1927, and became final a year later on August 25, 1928. She appeared in just two more films: Mr Broadway (1933) as herself and The Devil’s Sleep (1951) as Judge Rosalind Ballentine.

  CAUSE: She died aged 87 of cancer in Los Angeles, California.

  D.W. Griffith

  (DAVID LEWELYN WARK GRIFFITH)

  Born January 22, 1875

  Died July 24, 1948

  Cinematic legend. Born on a farm near Crestwood, Oldham County, Kentucky, the son of a doctor who fought in the Mexican War and served in the Kentucky legislature, Griffith was one of the earliest pioneers of movies, but he didn’t have the gift of foresight. He once commented: “It’ll never be possible to synchronise the voice
with the pictures.” Nonetheless, he was a prolific writer, director and producer. He directed over 500 films, wrote over 200, produced over 40 and found time to act in over 30! Acting was his passion and it was only when he found himself short of money that he began to take a number of menial jobs before joining Biograph. From 1908 he wrote and directed films for them, forming a partnership with cameraman Billy Bitzer before leaving in September 1913 for Reliance-Majestic. It was his American Civil War film epic The Birth Of A Nation (1915) (which he wrote, directed, produced, edited and composed the music for) that made his name. It cost $91,000 to make and recouped $5 million. It was the first film shown in the White House and President Woodrow Wilson loved it. It also brought criticism and controversy over charges of racism for its sympathetic portrayal of the Ku Klux Klan (membership trebled) and less sympathetic showing of blacks. Only one black actor was hired. All the rest of the ‘black’ faces are made-up white ones. On the other hand, many historians regard the movie as the most important development in the art film genre. The film lasted for almost three hours and tickets cost a remarkable $2 each. His next major film, which took two years and $2.5 million (much of it Griffith’s own money) to make was the epic Intolerance (1916). (On July 20, 1915, while making Intolerance, Griffith had teamed up with Thomas Ince and Mack Sennett to form the Triangle Motion Picture Company. They built a studio for Mabel Normand to make Mickey [1918] but their hopes of making her a big star were dashed when she signed for Samuel Goldwyn.) Intolerance was a commercial disaster and Griffith found himself in financial trouble. To get out of dire straits he worked tirelessly and on February 5, 1919, Griffith, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks formed United Artists to produce and sell their own films and those of other independents. His first film for the new venture was Broken Blossoms (1919). During the filming of Way Down East (1920) his star Lillian Gish was made to suffer for her art. She endured permanent damage to her hand by having to trail it in icy water. The film turned out to be Griffith’s second most commercially successful. He worked steadily without ever quite finding success again and his last film, the appropriately named The Struggle (1931), was a disaster. A womaniser, he married twice. His first wife (on May 14, 1906, at the Old North Church, Boston) was Linda Arvidson. Separated since 1911, they divorced on March 2, 1936. Number two (also on March 2, 1936) was Evelyn Baldwin, 35 years his junior.