Fredric March
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| Fredric March | |||||||||||
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 photograph by Carl Van Vechten (1939) |
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| Born | Ernest Frederick McIntyre Bickel August 31, 1897 Racine, Wisconsin, United States |
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| Died | April 14, 1975 (aged 77) Los Angeles, California, United States |
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Fredric March (August 31, 1897 – April 14, 1975) was an American two-time Academy Award and Tony Award-winning stage and film actor.
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[edit] Biography
Born Ernest Frederick McIntyre Bickel in Racine, Wisconsin, he attended the Winslow Elementary School (established in 1855), Racine High School, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he was a member of Alpha Delta Phi. He began a career as a banker, but an emergency appendectomy caused him to reevaluate his life, and in 1920 he began working as an extra in movies made in New York City, using a shortened form of his mother's maiden name, Marcher. He appeared on Broadway in 1926, and by the end of the decade signed a film contract with Paramount Pictures.
March won an Oscar nomination in 1930 for The Royal Family of Broadway, in which he played a role based upon John Barrymore. He won the Oscar for Best Actor in 1932 for Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and again in 1946 for The Best Years of Our Lives. On March 25, 1954, March co-hosted the 26th Annual Academy Awards ceremony from New York City, with co-host Donald O'Connor in Los Angeles.
March was one of the few actors to resist signing long-term contracts with the studios, and was able to freelance and pick and choose his roles, in the process also avoiding typecasting. By this time, he was working on Broadway as often as in Hollywood, and his screen career was not as prolific as it had been.
March, however, won two Best Actor Tony Awards: in 1947 for the play Years Ago, written by Ruth Gordon; and in 1957 for his performance as James Tyrone in the original Broadway production of Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into Night.
March's neighbor in Connecticut, playwright Arthur Miller, was thought to favor March to inaugurate the part of Willy Loman in the Pulitzer Prize-winning Death of a Salesman (1949). However, director Elia Kazan cast Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, and Arthur Kennedy as his son Biff Loman, two men that the director had worked with in the film Boomerang (1947). March later played Willy Loman in Columbia Pictures's 1951 film version of the play, directed by Laslo Benedek. Perhaps March's greatest late-in-life role was in Inherit the Wind (1960), opposite Spencer Tracy.
When March underwent surgery for prostate cancer in 1972, it seemed his career was over, yet he managed to give one last great performance in The Iceman Cometh (1973), as the complicated Irish bartender, Harry Hope. Coincidentally, co-star Robert Ryan was entering the final stages of lung cancer, so the film was the last for both March and Ryan.
Although March died in Los Angeles, California at the age of 77 from cancer, he considered the rural Litchfield County town of New Milford, Connecticut his primary residence since the 1930's. This property was subsequently home to American playwright Lillian Hellman as well as former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. March was married to actress Florence Eldridge from 1927 until his death, and they had two adopted children.
Throughout his life, he and his wife were supporters of the Democratic Party and liberal political causes. His support for the Republican (Second Spanish Republic) side during the Spanish Civil War was particularly controversial.
March has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1616 Vine Street.
[edit] Filmography
[edit] Academy Awards and nominations
- 1952 Nominated Death of a Salesman
- 1947 Won The Best Years of Our Lives
- 1938 Nominated A Star Is Born
- 1932 Won Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
- 1931 Nominated The Royal Family of Broadway
[edit] External links
- Fredric March at the Internet Movie Database
- Photographs of Fredric March
- Fredric March at Find A Grave
| Awards | ||
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| Preceded by Jean Gabin for La Nuit est Mon Royaume |
Venice Film Festival Volpi Cup Best Actor 1952 for Death of a Salesman |
Succeeded by Henri Vilbert for Le Bon Dieu Sans Confession |
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Emil Jannings (1928) · Warner Baxter (1929) · George Arliss (1930) · Lionel Barrymore (1931) · Fredric March / Wallace Beery (1932) · Charles Laughton (1933) · Clark Gable (1934) · Victor McLaglen (1935) · Paul Muni (1936) · Spencer Tracy (1937) · Spencer Tracy (1938) · Robert Donat (1939) · James Stewart (1940) Complete List · (1928–1940) · (1941–1960) · (1961–1980) · (1981–2000) · (2001-present) |
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Gary Cooper (1941) · James Cagney (1942) · Paul Lukas (1943) · Bing Crosby (1944) · Ray Milland (1945) · Fredric March (1946) · Ronald Colman (1947) · Laurence Olivier (1948) · Broderick Crawford (1949) · José Ferrer (1950) · Humphrey Bogart (1951) · Gary Cooper (1952) · William Holden (1953) · Marlon Brando (1954) · Ernest Borgnine (1955) · Yul Brynner (1956) · Alec Guinness (1957) · David Niven (1958) · Charlton Heston (1959) · Burt Lancaster (1960) Complete List · (1928–1940) · (1941–1960) · (1961–1980) · (1981–2000) · (2001–present) |
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José Ferrer / Fredric March (1947) · Henry Fonda / Paul Kelly / Basil Rathbone (1948) · Rex Harrison (1949) · Sidney Blackmer (1950) · Claude Rains (1951) · José Ferrer (1952) · Tom Ewell (1953) · David Wayne (1954) · Alfred Lunt (1955) · Paul Muni (1956) · Fredric March (1957) · Ralph Bellamy (1958) · Jason Robards, Jr. (1959) · Melvyn Douglas (1960) · Zero Mostel (1961) · Paul Scofield (1962) · Arthur Hill (1963) · Alec Guinness (1964) · Walter Matthau (1965) · Hal Holbrook (1966) · Paul Rogers (1967) · Martin Balsam (1968) · James Earl Jones (1969) · Fritz Weaver (1970) · Brian Bedford (1971) · Cliff Gorman (1972) · Alan Bates (1973) · Michael Moriarty (1974) · John Kani / Winston Ntshona (1975) |
| Persondata | |
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| NAME | March, Fredric |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Bickel, Ernest Frederick McIntyre |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | actor |
| DATE OF BIRTH | August 31, 1897 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Racine, Washington |
| DATE OF DEATH | April 14, 1975 |
| PLACE OF DEATH | Los Angeles, California |
