Fade to Black: A Book of Movie Obituaries

by Paul Donnelley

  CAUSE: After suffering many years of poor health, Chico died of a heart attack aged 75 in Hollywood. He was buried in Forest Lawn Memorial-Parks, 1712 Glendale Avenue, Glendale, California 91209. Groucho died aged 86 in Los Angeles, of pneumonia. He was buried in Eden Memorial Park, 11500 Sepulveda Boulevard, San Fernando, California 91345. Gummo died aged 84 of lung cancer. He, too, was interred in Forest Lawn Memorial-Parks. Harpo died in Los Angeles during heart surgery aged 75. Zeppo died of cancer aged 78. He was cremated and his ashes scattered at sea.

  James Mason

  Born May 15, 1909

  Died July 27, 1984

  The nearly man. Born in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, James Neville Mason earned a first in architecture from Peterhouse College, Cambridge. He then went on to join the Old Vic and appeared with the Gate Company Players in Dublin before moving into movies although he was sacked from The Private Life Of Don Juan (1934) and his official début came as Jim Martin in Late Extra (1935). For a time he was a journeyman in films such as Twice Branded (1936) as Henry Hamilton, Troubled Waters as John Merriman, Secret Of Stamboul (1936) as Larry, Blind Man’s Bluff (1936) as Stephen Neville, The Mill On The Floss (1937) as Tom Tulliver, The High Command as Captain Heverell, Catch As Catch Can (1937) as Robert Leyland, The Return Of The Scarlet Pimpernel (1938) as Jean Tallien, I Met A Murderer (1939) as Mark Warrow, Alibi (1942) as Andre Laurent, Secret Mission (1942) as Raoul de Carnot, before making his mark in The Man In Grey (1943) as the sadist Marquis of Rohan. He also excelled opposite Ann Todd in The Seventh Veil (1945) as baddie Nicholas and was splendid as an IRA gunman, Johnny McQueen, in Carol Reed’s Odd Man Out (1947). In 1947 he moved to America following that film (Mason had been a conscientious objector during the war) and The Wicked Lady (1945) in which he played another baddie, Captain Jerry Jackson. Many believe his early work in Hollywood lacked bite. He appeared in Odd Man Out (1947) as Johnny McQueen, Madame Bovary (1949) as Gustave Flaubert, The Reckless Moment (1949) as Martin Donnelly, One Way Street (1950) as Doc Matson, The Desert Fox: The Story Of Rommel (1951) as Erwin Rommel, The Prisoner Of Zenda (1952) as Rupert of Hentzau, Five Fingers (1952) as Albanian valet Ulysses Diello/‘Cicero’, Julius Caesar (1953) as Brutus, The Desert Rats (1953) reprising his role as Erwin Rommel and 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea (1954) as the submarine Nautilus’ crazed Captain Nemo. He silenced his critics with his portrayal of Norman Maine in the remake of A Star Is Born (1954), played by Frederic March in the 1937 original. He was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar for his work, although he never really liked the film. He also shone in Journey To The Center Of The Earth (1959) as Professor Oliver Lindenbrook, Alfred Hitchcock’s North By Northwest (1959) as Phillip Vandamm menacing Cary Grant, The Trials Of Oscar Wilde (1960) as lawyer Sir Edward Carson, Lolita (1962) as the middle-aged professor Humbert Humbert obsessed with the young Sue Lyon, Lord Jim (1965) as Gentleman Brown, Genghis Khan (1965) as Kam Ling, The Blue Max (1966) as General Count von Klugermann, Georgy Girl (1966) as sugar daddy James Leamington, for which he was nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar, Mayerling (1968) as Emperor Franz Joseph, Age Of Consent (1969) as Bradley Monahan, in which Helen Mirren appeared nude, Murder By Decree (1979) as a bumbling Dr John H. Watson to Christopher Plummer’s Holmes, The Verdict (1982) as trial lawyer Edward J. Concannon, for which he was nominated for his second Best Supporting Actor Oscar, The Shooting Party (1984) and The Assisi Underground (1985) as Bishop Nicolini. He also appeared in a number of foreign language films, which neither helped nor harmed his career. Rumours of Mason’s supposed homosexuality have long been in circulation, though he married twice. His first wife was Pamela Kellino (b. March 10, 1916, d. June 29, 1996), whom he married at Amersham Registry Office in February 1941. They divorced on August 31, 1964. His second trip up the aisle was with Clarissa Kaye on August 13, 1971. According to many accounts, Mason was “so opinionated and rude that it was a lesson in self-delusion just to catch a glimpse of him.”

  CAUSE: Mason died of a massive coronary in Lausanne, Switzerland, aged 75. He had suffered heart problems for some time and had a pacemaker fitted. He was buried in Vevey.

  FURTHER READING: Before I Forget: An Autobiography & Drawings – James Mason (London: Sphere, 1982); Odd Man Out – Sheridan Morley (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1989).

  Raymond Massey

  Born August 30, 1896

  Died July 29, 1983

  Patriarch. Born in Toronto and educated at Balliol College, Oxford, Massey began his acting career on stage in London in 1922 and progressed to the big screen nine years later. In 1944 he became an American citizen. He was able to play across the spectrum of human endeavour from villains to US President Abraham Lincoln (Abe Lincoln In Illinois [1940], for which he was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar and How The West Was Won [1962]) to consulting detectives such as Sherlock Holmes in The Speckled Band (1932) to abolitionist John Brown in Santa Fe Trail (1940) and Seven Angry Men (1955). He was also in The Scarlet Pimpernel (1935), Things To Come (1936), Fire Over England (1937), The Prisoner Of Zenda (1937), Arsenic And Old Lace (1944) as Jonathan Brewster, A Matter Of Life And Death (1946) as Abraham Farlan, East Of Eden (1955) as James Dean’s father Adam Trask and The Naked And The Dead (1958). Massey played the wise old Dr Leonard Gillespie on television in Dr Kildare from September 28, 1961, until August 30, 1966. He was married three times – in 1921 to Margery Fremantle, actress Adrianne Allan (from November 12, 1929, until July 6, 1939) and (on July 10, 1939) lawyer Dorothy Ludington Whitney – and two of his three children, Daniel and Anna, followed him onto the boards.

  CAUSE: He died of pneumonia aged 86 in Los Angeles. He was buried in Beaverdale Memorial Park, 90 Pine Rock Avenue, Hamden, Connecticut 06515.

  Marcello Mastroianni

  Born September 28, 1923

  Died December 19, 1996

  Latin lover. Born in Fontana Liri, Italy, Mastroianni was originally a draughtsman and was sent to a German labour camp in 1942 but escaped and fled to Venice where he hid until the liberation. Joining an amateur theatre group in Rome, he was spotted by Luchino Visconti, who cast him in White Knights (1957). He made over 100 films (“but only ten of them are any good”), though his best work was probably as journalist Marcello Rubini in Federico Fellini’s La Dolce Vita (1959). A lapsed Catholic, he married actress Flora Carabella in 1950 but that didn’t stop him fooling around. He had a well-publicised affair with Faye Dunaway, who dumped him in 1971 and fathered a daughter, Chiara-Charlotte, in 1972 by Catherine Deneuve, during a three-year affair. He was nominated for an Oscar on three occasions – for playing Ferdinando in Divorce, Italian Style (1962), Gabriele in A Special Day (1977) and Romano in Oci Ciornie (1987).

  CAUSE: He died of pancreatic cancer aged 73 in Paris.

  Walter Matthau

  (WALTER MATASSCHANSKAYASKY)

  Born October 1, 1920

  Died July 1, 2000

  Stolid comedic actor. Born in New York City to a pair of Russian-Jewish immigrants, Matthau was raised on the impoverished Lower East Side and sold soft drinks and played bit parts at a Second Avenue Yiddish theatre at age 11. His father was from Kiev; he left home when Walter was three, died in 1935 and Matthau was plagued by insecurity. After leaving school he was a boxing instructor, basketball coach and a filing clerk. He was known for his bloodhound face and throaty growl. When filling out an official form in 1937, he declared ‘Foghorn’ was his middle name. From 1941 to 1945 he served in the United States air force as a radio operator and air gunner. After the war he took advantage of the GI Bill of Rights and returned to New York to study at the New School for Social Research Dramatic Workshop under the renowned German director Erwin Piscator, from whom he acquired “the real feeling for acting”. He then joined a summer stock company and began to land parts on Broadway. In 1955 he was in a revival of the musical Guys And Dolls playing Nathan Detroit, and the playwright Michael Freeman in Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? opposite Jayne Mansfield. He had made his film début five years earlier in Atomic Attack (
1950). In his early films he was often cast as the baddie. In Goodbye Charlie (1964) he played a film producer, a role based on Alexander Korda. But for a long time it seemed Matthau was destined to remain a supporting player. His big break came in 1965 in Neil Simon’s The Odd Couple, a comedy of two divorced men trying to live together. Matthau’s slob sportswriter, Oscar Madison, won a Tony award (Simon had written the part specifically for him). The two men are quite unable to get on. “Everything you do irritates me,” Oscar complains to Felix Unger. “And when you’re not here, the things I know you’re going to do irritate me.” At 44, Matthau became one of America’s leading comic actors. He followed that up with an Oscar as Best Supporting Actor for his performance as Whiplash Willy, a conman lawyer, who forces his only slightly injured client to sue for a million dollars’ damages in Billy Wilder’s The Fortune Cookie (1966). It was the first picture that teamed Matthau with Jack Lemmon, who provided a perfect foil. During shooting Matthau suffered a heart attack, but he was able to resume filming after a seven-week break. Matthau and Lemmon were reunited in 1968 for a film version of The Odd Couple. In 1971 Lemmon directed Matthau in Kotch, a comedy about a miserable old granddad trying to make it up with his family. Matthau was nominated for another Oscar for his performance. He appeared as Horace Vandergelder opposite Barbra Streisand in the musical Hello Dolly! (1969). But they couldn’t stand each other. He said of Streisand that she “has as much talent as a butterfly’s fart”. During the Seventies he starred in more Neil Simon vehicles: Plaza Suite (1971), in which he played three parts – an unfaithful husband, a Hollywood producer, and a harassed father-of-the-bride; The Sunshine Boys (1975) and California Suite (1978). Matthau and Jack Lemmon and Billy Wilder were reunited in 1974 with a Billy Wilder remake of the newspaper comedy The Front Page. Matthau, Lemmon and Wilder were together again for Buddy Buddy (1981), a remake of the witty French L’Emmerdeur which suffered badly by comparison with its original. In the meantime, Glenda Jackson was Matthau’s leading lady in House Calls (1978), in which he was a recently widowed man seeking a new lover and she was a divorcée. They were together again in the spy film Hopscotch (1980). Matthau and Lemmon were together again in Grumpy Old Men in 1993, Grumpier Old Men in 1995 and Out To Sea in 1997. He and Lemmon rather ill-advisedly made The Odd Couple II in 1998, thirty years after the first film. It was not a success. Reports are now circulating that 6́ 3˝ Matthau made up as a joke the fact that he was born Walter Matasschanskayasky or Walter Matuschanskayasky and that his real “real” name is Matthow. According to his son, Charlie Matthau, on Larry King Live, July 14, 2000, his real name was Walter Matthow, and he changed it to be more exotic. Walter Matthau was married twice. In 1948 he married Grace Johnson. He had a son, David, and a daughter, Jennie, by the marriage before the 1958 divorce. On August 21, 1959 he married the actress and writer Carol Marcus (who was born in New York on September 11, 1926 and was previously married to the novelist William Saroyan). They had one son, Charlie (b. December 10, 1965), who directed him in The Grass Harp (1995). “I never mind my wife having the last word,” he once said. “In fact, I’m delighted when she gets to it.”

  CAUSE: Matthau suffered a heart attack while making The Fortune Cookie (1966) as soon as he became a star. “My doctor gave me six months to live,” he quipped, “and then, when I couldn’t pay the bill, he gave me six months more.” Due to heavy smoking he had heart bypass surgery in 1976. In 1993, he was hospitalised for double pneumonia. In 1995, he had a benign colon tumour removed. In 1999, he was hospitalised again for pneumonia. In the summer of 2000, Matthau was taken to the St John’s Health Center after suffering a heart attack but was pronounced dead shortly afterwards at 1.42am. He was 79. He was buried at Westwood Village Memorial Park, 1218 Glendon Avenue, Los Angeles 90024.

  Jessie Matthews, OBE

  Born March 11, 1907

  Died August 19, 1981

  Britain’s Dancing Divinity. “She was a much greater dancer than Ginger Rogers and I thought a better actress,” said Sir Dirk Bogarde. Born at 94 Berwick Street, Soho, London, the seventh of sixteen children of whom eleven reached maturity, Jessie Margaret Matthews was the daughter of a stall holder in Berwick Street market. A brilliant dancer, she was treading the boards before she turned 11 in Bluebell In Fairyland in 1919. She was given a job in the chorus line by impresario C.B. Cochran who said she was “an interesting-looking child with enormous eyes and the funniest little nose, wearing clothes which seemed too large for her, and holding with both hands a huge umbrella.” She made her film début in The Beloved Vagabond (1923) as Pan. At Hammersmith Register Office on February 17, 1926 she married the actor Henry Lytton, Jr (b. 1906, d. Blackpool, September 16, 1965) but they divorced in London on November 21, 1929 because of his adultery. The decree became absolute on June 2, 1930. She was given elocution lessons to rid her of her cockney accent and her star began to ascend in films such as Out Of The Blue (1931) as Tommy Tucker, There Goes The Bride (1932) as Annette Marquand and Waltzes From Vienna (1933) as Rasi. She was signed to a contract by Michael Balcon and appeared in The Good Companions (1933) as Susie Dean and Friday The Thirteenth (1933) as Millie. Her best musical of the Thirties was probably Victor Saville’s Evergreen (1934) in which she played Harriet Green/Harriet Hawkes. Due to sign a contract with MGM she suffered a breakdown in 1934 and the American studio pulled out. On January 24, 1931 at Hampstead Register Office she married myopic 5́ 7˝ John Robert Hale-Monro, Jr (b. London, May 1, 1902, d. London, June 9, 1959 of myelofibrosis) known professionally as Sonnie Hale. He had been married to Evelyn Laye and when they divorced on July 11, 1930 Jessie received much unwanted publicity as the “other woman” after being cited as co-respondent. Attending the hearing in the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division of the High Court of Justice with Hale, she fainted and was later horrified to hear the judge, Sir Maurice Hill, describe her as “a person of an odious mind”. The two women became mortal enemies and on February 28 Jessie was not presented to King George V and Queen Mary when they went to see The Good Companions because it was considered “inappropriate”. However, the monarch and his consort saw her in the back row of the New Victoria Cinema and smiled and nodded at her. Hale directed her in Head Over Heels In Love (1937) in which she was Jeanne, Gangway (1937) as Pat Wayne and Sailing Along (1938) as Kay Martin. He did not possess Victor Saville’s light touch. On December 18, 1934, two months early, she gave birth to John Robert Hale-Monro III, who died aged just four hours. In February 1935 she adopted a daughter, Catherine (b. January 4, 1935). In August 1936 she suffered another serious mental breakdown. Her career was ended in all but name by the Second World War. She suffered yet another breakdown, her marriage ended (in London on July 3, 1944) and she made only the occasional foray into films such as Tom Thumb (1958) as Anne and The Hound Of The Baskervilles (1978) as Mrs Tinsdale. She had a brief role in the TV series Edward & Mrs Simpson. At Chelsea Register Office on August 9, 1945 she married Lieutenant (Richard) Brian Lewis, twelve years younger than her. A son was stillborn on the morning of December 28, 1945. They divorced on October 16, 1958. On March 18, 1963 she took over the part of Mrs (Mary) Dale in the BBC radio series The Dales. “Sustaining a long personal relationship was just not within her power,” said Vincent Shaw. “She wanted to be a star. She was a star and I think she was quite happy with it … She was too selfish to want anything else … When she ceased to be a big star she was a very lonely lady.”

  CAUSE: She died of cancer in Eastcote, Middlesex, aged 74. She left £56,503.

  FURTHER READING: Jessie Matthews– Michael Thornton (London: Hart-Davis, MacGibbon, 1974).

  Victor Mature

  Born January 29, 1913

  Died August 4, 1999

  ‘The Hunk’. Born in Louisville, Kentucky, the second son of immigrants Marcellus G. (1878–1941) and Clara R. (1886–1959), 6́ 2˝ Victor John Mature’s career was built more on his physique than his acting ability, as he was the first to admit. He was signed by Hal Roach and made his début in The Ho
usekeeper’s Daughter (1939) but it was his appearance as a caveman in One Million BC that made cinemagoers sit up and take notice. He signed for Fox who placed him opposite his then real-life girlfriend Betty Grable in I Wake Up Screaming (1941), Song Of The Islands (1942) and Footlight Serenade (1942). In 1942 he went into the coast guard, where he stayed for the remainder of the war. In 1946 he portrayed Doc Holliday opposite Henry Fonda’s Wyatt Earp in John Ford’s historically inaccurate My Darling Clementine. Playing a killer in Kiss Of Death (1947) he watched as Richard Widmark stole the screen from the supposed star. Mature spent the next decade or so appearing in all sorts of epics including the lead male in Cecil B. DeMille’s Samson & Delilah (1949) opposite Hedy Lamarr, causing Groucho Marx to comment, “I never go to movies where the hero’s tits are bigger than the heroines.” The director noticed that Mature, a sensitive, intelligent man, was also, by his own admission, “a devout coward”. He was scared of almost everything – lions, fire, swords, insects, horses, etc. In 1984 he was lured back with a vast salary to play Samson’s father, Manoah, in a TV film. Mature stated, “For that money, I’d play his mother.” In The Robe (1953) he was afraid of a club so the props department fashioned one from a balloon. Mature’s fears were not alleviated – he thought the balloon might burst. He had an affair with Rita Hayworth and married five times: Frances Evans (January 30, 1938–1940); Martha Stevenson Kemp (June 18, 1941–February 10, 1943); Dorothy Stanford Berry (February 28, 1948–November 8, 1955), Adrianne Joy Urwich (September 27, 1959–February 6, 1969), Lorey Sabena (1974–until his death) by whom he had his only daughter, Victoria S., born on March 16, 1975. He retired in the Sixties, a very wealthy man, to play golf, but one of his more memorable film appearances that decade was as himself in the frankly bizarre Head (1968), starring The Monkees. “I’m no actor,” he once said, “and I have 64 pictures to prove it.”