ROBERT TAYLOR (ACTOR)

'Robert Taylor' (August 5 1911 – June 8 1969), was an American actor.
Born 'Spangler Arlington Brugh' (homonym of "brew"), he made his first film appearance in 1934. Clean cut and strikingly handsome with wavy dark hair and blue eyes, he was an instant heart-throb from the beginning. Early in his career, he was known as "the man with the perfect profile."

Contents

Early life

Acting career

McCarthy era controversy

Personal life

Death

Trivia

Selected filmography

External links

References

Early life

Spangler Arlington Brugh was born in Filley, Nebraska to a country doctor and his invalid wife. He had an impressive number of accomplishments to match his rather impressive name. As a teenager, he was a track star and showed a flair for public speaking. His real love, however, was music. He played the cello in his high school orchestra and upon graduation he enrolled at Doane College in Nebraska to study music.
Inspired by his father, who had become a doctor with the intent of curing his invalid wife, the younger Brugh subsequently changed tracks and moved west to study medicine at Pomona College in Los Angeles. While at Pomona he joined the campus theater group and, aided by his remarkable good looks, found yet another calling. He considered continuing on to drama school upon his graduation from Pomona in 1933, but before he could follow through on the plan an MGM talent scout spotted him and gave him both a contract and a new name.

Acting career

By his own admission, he was hardly the greatest actor of his generation, but his many directors and famous co-stars always found him a most professional actor, always on time and willing to work hard to get the film to be the best. Many actors and actresses later claimed that he was underrated as an actor, especially in films in his later years. Although he was known for his classic features, Taylor always strived for different films where he could play more rugged and challenging roles, not wanting to be known as just a "pretty face."
One of his first major films was ''Camille'' (1936), opposite Greta Garbo. When he was cast in the MGM musical Broadway Melody of 1936, his previous roles were all in Dramas. In the film, he surprised everyone with his pleasant singing voice. Mervyn LeRoy's drama ''Waterloo Bridge'' (1940, Taylor's personal favorite of his films), opposite Vivien Leigh, his former co-star in ''A Yank at Oxford'' (1938), was another of his successes at the box office during these years. By the early 1950s, his handsome face was already beginning to show signs of age, and roles were harder to come by. Still, he managed to make his mark in what would become one of his best known roles, as General Marcus Vinicius in ''Quo Vadis'' (1951), opposite Deborah Kerr. The following year, he starred opposite a much younger Elizabeth Taylor in the film version of Walter Scott’s classic ''Ivanhoe''. The movie proved to be a smash hit and MGM quickly followed it up with 1953’s ''Knights of the Round Table''.
In later life, he made many television appearances, notably in the 1959 series, ''The Detectives Starring Robert Taylor''.
In 1970, he was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

McCarthy era controversy

In 1947, Taylor testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) as a "friendly witness", claiming that he had appeared in the film ''Song of Russia'' against his better judgment. He went on to claim that the script by Richard Collins and Paul Jarrico, and a song in the movie written by Yip Harburg, were pro-Communist.
Taylor also provided evidence against actor Howard Da Silva. He is quoted as saying: "I can name a few who seem to sort of disrupt things once in a while. Whether or not they are Communists I don't know. One chap we have currently, I think is Howard Da Silva. He always seems to have something to say at the wrong time."

Personal life

His first wife was the actress Barbara Stanwyck. Taylor and Stanwyck were one of the Hollywood's "golden couples" and were good friends with another famous couple, Clark Gable and Carole Lombard. The marriage had its ups and downs, lasting from 1939 to 1951.
In 1951 Taylor starred in the film ''Above and Beyond'', a biopic of "Enola Gay" pilot Paul Tibbets. The two men met and found that they had much in common. Both had considered studying medicine, and were avid skeet-shooters and fliers. Taylor learned to fly in the mid-1930s, and served as a US Navy flying instructor during World War II. His private aircraft was a Twin Beech called "Missy" (wife Stanwyck's nickname) which he used on hunting and fishing trips. She complained that he spent all his time polishing his guns and aircraft, but when airborne could ''"do anything a bird could do, except sit on a barbed wire fence"''.^[1]
Taylor considered remarrying Stanwyck several times after their 1951 divorce. He also had a serious romance with Eleanor Parker, but ultimately he chose as his second wife German-born actress, Ursula Thiess, with whom he had two children. They owned a large ranch and home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Brentwood, California, which to this day is still referred to by locals as the old "Robert Taylor ranch." He was ultimately happy and well-suited to Thiess, who gave up her acting career when she became his wife, although she did a few spots on his later television series, ''Robert Taylor's Detectives''. She has written an autobiography ''.''

Death

Robert Taylor died of lung cancer (he was a chain smoker) at the age of 57, and he was interred in Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery, in Glendale, California. The ''crème de la crème'' of Hollywood celebrities went to his funeral, and his best friend Ronald Reagan gave the eulogy.

Trivia

★ In the Rodgers and Hart song "The Lady Is a Tramp", Taylor is immortalized in a verse ending with the line ''"for Robert Taylor I whistle and stamp / that's why the lady is a tramp."'' [1]

Selected filmography

★ ''Magnificent Obsession'' (1935)

★ ''Broadway Melody of 1936'' (1935)

★ ''Camille'' (1936)

★ ''Personal Property'' (1937)

★ ''Three Comrades'' (1938)

★ ''A Yank at Oxford'' (1938)

★ ''Lady of the Tropics'' (1939)

★ ''Waterloo Bridge'' (1940)

★ ''Billy the Kid'' (1941)

★ ''When Ladies Meet'' (1941)

★ ''Bataan'' (1942)

★ ''Undercurrent'' (1946)

★ ''High Wall'' (1947)

★ ''Conspirator'' (1949)

★ ''Quo Vadis'' (1951)

★ ''Westward the Women'' (1951)

★ ''Ivanhoe'' (1952)

★ ''Ride, Vaquero!'' (1953)

★ ''Knights of the Round Table'' (1953)

★ ''Rogue Cop'' (1954)

★ ''Valley of the Kings'' (1954)

★ ''The Adventures of Quentin Durward'' (1955)

★ ''The Last Hunt'' (1956)

★ ''D-Day the Sixth of June'' (1956)

★ ''The Law and Jake Wade'' (1958)

★ ''Party Girl'' (1958)

★ ''Miracle of the White Stallions'' (1963)

★ ''A House Is Not a Home'' (1964)

External links

★

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★ Robert Taylor collection at the Nebraska State Historical Society

References

1. Tibbets, Paul W., ''Mission: Hiroshima'', Stein & Day, 1985 ISBN 0-8128-8169-9