Edmond O'Brien Pics

Edmond

O`Brien

10 September 1915

70

Virgo

09 May 1985

Male

Average

New York City, New York

Inglewood, Calfornia

Alzheimer`s Disease

White

American

Edmond O'Brien (September 10, 1915 – May 9, 1985) was an Academy Award-winning American film actor who is perhaps best remembered for his role in D.O.A. (1950). His many memorable films included The Killers, White Heat, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and The Wild Bunch.

Oscar-winner Edmond O`Brien was one of the most respected character actors in American cinema from his heyday of the mid-1940s through the late 1960s. Born on September 10, 1915, in New York City borough of The Bronx New York, O`Brien learned the craft of performance as a magician, reportedly tutored by neighbor Harry Houdini. He took part in student theatrics in high school and majored in drama at Columbia University. He made his Broadway debut at the age of 21 in 1936 and later that year played The Gravedigger in the great Shakespearean actor John Gielgud`s legendary production of "Hamlet." Four years later, he would play Mercutio to the Romeo of another legendary Shakespearean, Laurence Olivier, in Olivier`s 1940 Brodway production of "Romeo & Juliet." Edmond O`Brien worked with another magician, Orson Welles, in the Mercury Theater`s production of "Julius Caesar," appearing as Mark Antony. He would later play Casca in Joseph L. Mankiewicz`s 1953 film of the play. O`Brien is erroneously said to have made his debut as an uncredited extra in the 1938 film Prison Break (1938), but the truth is his stage work impressed R.K.O. studio boss Pandro S. Berman, who brought him to Hollywood to appear in the plum supporting part of Gringoire in The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939), which starred Charles Laughton in the title role. After returning from his wartime service with the Army Air Force, Edmond O`Brien built up a distinguished career as a supporting actor in A-list films, and as an occasional character lead such as in D.O.A. (1950). Edmond O`Brien won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in The Barefoot Contessa (1954) and also was received a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nod for his role as a drunken senator ferreting out an attempted coup d`etat in Seven Days in May (1964). He also appeared as the crusty old timer Freddy who antagonizes Ben Johnson`s character Tector Gorch in director Sam Peckinpah`s classic Western The Wild Bunch (1969). Increasingly, he appeared on television in the 1960s and `70s, but managed a turn in his old boss Welles` unfinished film The Other Side of the Wind (1972). O`Brien married and divorced the actresses Nancy Kelly and Olga San Juan, with the latter wife being the mother of his three children, including actors Maria O`Brien and `Brendan O`Brien (II)`. He died in May 1985 Inglewood, California, of Alzheimer`s Disease and was interred in the Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California.

Redmond O`Brien

5

John Wayne

69