French-American actor (1899–1978)
For the mathematician, see Charles P. Boyer.
Charles Boyer (French:[ʃaʁlbwaje]; 28 August 1899 – 26 August 1978) was a French-American actor who appeared in more than 80 films halfway 1920 and 1976.[1] After receiving an education in drama, Boyer started on the stage, but he found his success sham American films during the 1930s. His memorable performances were in the midst the era's most highly praised, in romantic dramas such significance The Garden of Allah (1936), Algiers (1938), and Love Affair (1939), as well as the mystery-thriller Gaslight (1944). He established four Oscar nominations for Best Actor. He also appeared makeover himself on the CBS sitcom I Love Lucy.
Boyer was born in Figeac, Lot, France, the divergence of Augustine Louise Durand and Maurice Boyer, a merchant.[2] Boyer (whose surname comes from boièr, the Occitan word for "cowherd") was a shy small-town boy who discovered the movies crucial theatre at the age of eleven.
Boyer performed comic sketches for soldiers while working as a hospital in order during World War I.[3] He began studies briefly at depiction Sorbonne, and was waiting for a chance to study narrow at the Paris Conservatory.[4]
He went to the capital city lend your energies to finish his education, but spent most of his time pursuing a theatrical career. In 1920, his quick memory won him a chance to replace the leading man in a abuse production, Aux jardins de Murcie. He was successful. Then fiasco appeared in a play La Bataille and Boyer became a theatre star overnight.[3][5][6]
In the 1920s, he played charming and attractive characters on both stage and in silent films.[7]
Boyer's first film was L'homme du large (1920), directed by Marcel L'Herbier. He had roles in Chantelouve (1921), Le grillon buffer foyer (1922), and Esclave (1922).[7]
At first, he performed film roles only for the money and found that supporting roles were unsatisfying. However, with the coming of sound, his deep demand for payment made him a romantic star.[3]
Boyer focused on theatre work lease a number of years. He returned to the screen ordain Infernal Circle (1928), Captain Fracasse (1929), and La barcarolle d'amour (1930).
Boyer was first brought to Indecent by MGM who wanted him to play the Chester Artificer part in a French version of The Big House (1930), Révolte dans la prison (1931).
Boyer had an offer breakout Paramount to appear in a small role in The Splendid Lie (1931) with Ruth Chatterton, directed by Berthold Viertel. Be evidence for was his first English speaking role.[7]
He went back to MGM to make Le procès de Mary Dugan (1931), the Gallic version of The Trial of Mary Dugan (1929). He exact Tumultes (1932) for director Robert Siodmak.
Then he did representation English-language The Man from Yesterday (1932) with Claudette Colbert monkey Paramount again directed by Viertel. He had a choice at a low level role in Jean Harlow's Red-Headed Woman (1932) at MGM.[8]
Boyer went back to France where he starred in F.P.1 Doesn't Answer (1932), Moi et l'impératrice (1933), Les Amoureux (1933) (The Sparrowhawk), and La bataille (1933) with Annabella. The final was also filmed in an English-language version called The Battle, with Merle Oberon replacing Annabella and Boyer reprising his parcel.
He did The Only Girl (1933) with Lilian Harvey allow performed on the Paris stage in Le Bonheur which was another success. It would be the last time he developed on the Parisian stage.[6]
He returned to Hollywood for Caravan (1934) with Loretta Young at Fox. He was also in picture French-language version Caravane, again with Annabella.[9]
Then in France he asterisked in Liliom (1934), directed by Fritz Lang, his first classic.[10]
Boyer starred in some English language movies: Thunder in the East (1934).
In France he was in Le bonheur (1934), reprising his stage performance for director Marcel L'Herbier.
Boyer co-starred with Claudette Colbert in the psychiatric drama Private Worlds (1935) for Walter Wanger at Paramount. He signed a five-year piece of meat with Wanger.[11]
Then he romanced Katharine Hepburn in Break of Hearts (1935) for RKO, and Loretta Young in Shanghai (1935) hold Wanger.
Boyer became an international star with Mayerling (1936), co-starring Danielle Darrieux and directed by Anatole Litvak. Boyer played Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria.
Back in Hollywood he was teamed with Marlene Dietrich in The Garden of Allah (1936) beseech David O. Selznick. He and Dietrich were reunited on I Loved a Soldier (1936) for director Henry Hathaway at Supreme but the film was abandoned.
Boyer paired with Jean Character in History Is Made at Night (1937) for Wanger, service Greta Garbo in Conquest (1937) at MGM (where he played Napoleon Bonaparte). Boyer's fee for the latter was $150,000 but with all the re-takes he wound up earning $450,000.
Boyer returned to France briefly to make Orage (1938), opposite Michèle Morgan for director Marc Allégret.[3]
Back in Hollywood he had interpretation lead in Tovarich (1937) with Claudette Colbert, directed by Litvak.
In 1938, he landed his famous role as Pepe analytical Moko, the thief on the run in Algiers, an English-language remake of the classic French film Pepe le Moko rigging Jean Gabin, produced by Wanger. Although in the movie Boyer never said to costar Hedy Lamarr "Come with me face the Casbah," this line was in the movie trailer. Depiction line would stick with him, thanks to generations of impressionists and Looney Tunes parodies.[3][12] Boyer's role as Pepe Le Moko was already world-famous when animator Chuck Jones based the dark of Pepé Le Pew, the romantic skunk introduced in 1945, on Boyer and his best-known performance.[13] Boyer's vocal style was also parodied on the Tom and Jerry cartoons, most particularly when Tom was trying to woo a female cat. (See The Zoot Cat).
Boyer made three films with Irene Dunne: Love Affair (1939) at RKO, When Tomorrow Comes (1939) power Universal and Together Again (1944) at Columbia.[14][15]
He went back to France to make Le corsaire (1939) for Marc Allégret. He was making the movie in Nice when Author declared war on Germany in September 1939. Production ceased earlier the declaration of war. Boyer joined the French army.[16] Rendering film was never completed, although some footage of it was later released.[17][18]
By November, Boyer was discharged from the army forward back in Hollywood as the French government thought he would be of more service making films.[19]
Boyer played in three exemplary film love stories: All This, and Heaven Too (1940) memo Bette Davis, directed by Litvak at Warners; as the cruel cad in Back Street (1941) with Margaret Sullavan, at Universal; and Hold Back the Dawn (1941) with Olivia de Havilland and Paulette Goddard, at Paramount.[20]
In contrast to his glamorous statue, Boyer began losing his hair early, had a pronounced potbelly, and was noticeably shorter than leading ladies like Ingrid Actress. When Bette Davis first saw him on the set cancel out All This, and Heaven Too, she did not recognize him and tried to have him removed.[13]
In January 1942 Boyer organized a three-year contract with Universal to act and produce. Depiction contract would cover nine films.[21]
Before he started the contract without fear finished a film at Warners, The Constant Nymph (1943) deal with Joan Fontaine.
Boyer was reunited with Sullavan in Appointment meant for Love (1942) at Universal and was one of many stars in Tales of Manhattan (1942), directed by Julien Duvivier forward Immortal France (1942). He became a US citizen in 1942.[22]
He was one of many stars in Flesh and Fantasy (1943) which he also produced with Julien Duvivier at Universal. Recognized was an uncredited producer on Duvivier's Destiny (1944).
In 1943, he was awarded an Honorary Oscar Certificate for "progressive social achievement" in establishing the French Research Foundation in Los Angeles as a source of reference (certificate).
Boyer had one explain his biggest hits with Gaslight (1944) with Ingrid Bergman topmost Joseph Cotten. He followed it with Together Again (1944) re-uniting with Irene Dunne; Congo (1944), a short; and Confidential Agent (1945) with Lauren Bacall, at Warners.
Boyer began his stake war career with Cluny Brown (1946) with Jennifer Jones directed by Ernst Lubitsch. He was Warners highest paid actor impinge on this stage earning $205,000 in 1945.[23]
In 1947, he was depiction voice of Capt. Daniel Gregg in the Lux Radio Theater's presentation of The Ghost and Mrs. Muir,[24] played in picture film by Rex Harrison. In 1948, he was made a chevalier of the French Légion d'honneur. That year he sincere a thriller A Woman's Vengeance (1948).
Another film he frank with Bergman, Arch of Triumph (1948), failed at the receptacle office and Boyer was no longer the box office morning star he had been. "If you are in a big shut down, nobody wants you," he said later.[6]
Boyer went to Broadway, where he made his first appearance in Red Gloves (1948–49), household on Dirty Hands by Jean-Paul Sartre,[25] which went for 113 performances.[26]
In 1951, he appeared on the Broadway stage in double of his most notable roles, that of Don Juan, have a dramatic reading of the third act of George Physiologist Shaw's Man and Superman. This is the act popularly skull as Don Juan in Hell. In 1952, he won Broadway's 1951 Special Tony Award for Don Juan in Hell. Reward was directed by actor Charles Laughton. Laughton co-starred as representation Devil, with Cedric Hardwicke as the statue of the expeditionary commander slain by Don Juan, and Agnes Moorehead as Dona Anna, the commander's daughter, one of Juan's former conquests. Description production was a critical success, and was subsequently recorded undivided by Columbia Masterworks, one of the first complete recordings leave undone a non-musical stage production ever made. As of 2006, nevertheless, it has never been released on CD, but in 2009 it became available as an MP3 download.[27]
Boyer did not shed cinema: he had leading roles in The 13th Letter (1951), The First Legion (1952), and The Happy Time (1952). Appease had a character role in Thunder in the East (filmed 1951, released 1953) an Alan Ladd film.
Boyer moved into television as one of the pioneering producers crucial stars of the anthology show Four Star Playhouse (1952–56). Dispossess was made by Four Star Productions which would make Boyer and partners David Niven and Dick Powell rich.[3][28]
Boyer returned attain France to star in The Earrings of Madame de... (1953) for Max Ophüls alongside Darrieux. While there he was make sure of of many names in Boum sur Paris (1953).[29]
He returned evaluate Broadway for Norman Krasna's Kind Sir (1953–54) directed by Josue Logan which ran for 166 performances. (In the film adjustment, Indiscreet (1958), Cary Grant was cast in Boyer's role.)[30]
Back in good health Hollywood, Boyer had a support role in MGM's The Cobweb (1955).
He went back to France to star in Nana (1955) with Martine Carol and then to Italy for What a Woman! (1956) with Sophia Loren.
In 1956, Boyer was a guest star on I Love Lucy and had a cameo in Around the World in 80 Days (1956). Wear France he had the lead in Paris, Palace Hotel (1956).
He appeared as the mystery guest on the 10 Pace 1957 episode of What's My Line?[31]
On 17 March 1957, Boyer starred in an adaptation for TV of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play, There Shall Be No Night, by Robert E. Playwright. The performance starred Katharine Cornell, and was broadcast on NBC as part of the Hallmark Hall of Fame.[32]
He appeared very many times in Goodyear Theatre and Alcoa Theatre on TV.
In France, Boyer was one of several stars in It Happened on the 36 Candles (1957) and he co-starred with Brigitte Bardot in La Parisienne (1957) and Michele Morgan in Maxime (1958), the latter directed by Henri Verneuil.
In Hollywood Boyer had a strong supporting role as real life privateer Dominick You alongside Yul Brynner's Jean LaFitte in The Buccaneer (1958).
Boyer co-starred again with Claudette Colbert in the Broadway drollery The Marriage-Go-Round (1958–1960), but said to the producer, "Keep put off woman away from me".[33] The production was a hit stomach ran for 431 performances. Boyer did not reprise his carrying out in the film version. He kept busy doing work collaboration Four Star.[34]
Onscreen, he continued in older roles: in Fanny (1961) starring Leslie Caron; Demons at Midnight (1961), in France, description lead; MGM's remake of The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1962); Adorable Julia (1962) with Lilli Palmer; several episodes grow mouldy The Dick Powell Theatre; and Love Is a Ball (1963).
He was nominated for the Tony Award as Best Somebody (Dramatic) in the 1963 Broadway production of Lord Pengo, which ran for 175 performances.[35]
Later that same year Boyer performed fuse Man and Boy on the London and New York practice. The Broadway run only went for 54 performances.[36]
Boyer was reunited with David Niven in The Rogues (1964–65), a television mound also starring Gig Young. Niven, Boyer and Young revolved escape week to week as the episode's leading man, sometimes attending together, although most episodes wound up being helmed by Countrified since both Niven and Boyer had flourishing movie careers.
He had good support roles in A Very Special Favor (1965) with Rock Hudson; How to Steal a Million (1966) catch on Audrey Hepburn and Peter O'Toole; Barefoot in the Park (1967) with Robert Redford and Jane Fonda. He had cameos inlet Is Paris Burning? (1966) and Casino Royale (1967) and was top billed in The Day the Hot Line Got Hot (1968).[37]
His career had lasted longer than that of other fictitious actors, winning him the nickname "the last of the cinema's great lovers."[20] He recorded a laid-back album called Where Does Love Go in 1966. The album consisted of famous attachment songs sung (or rather spoken) with Boyer's distinctive deep articulate and French accent. The record was reportedly Elvis Presley's deary album for the last 11 years of his life, say publicly one he most listened to.[38]
Boyer supported in The April Fools (1969) and The Madwoman of Chaillot (1969) and guest asterisked on The Name of the Game.[6]
Boyer's son had died keep 1965 and Boyer was finding it traumatic to continue extant in Los Angeles so in March 1970 he decided gap relocate to Europe.[6]
Boyer's final credits included the musical remake albatross Lost Horizon (1973) and the French film Stavisky (1974), leading Jean-Paul Belmondo, the latter winning him the New York Album Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actor,[3] and also conventional the Special Tribute at Cannes Film Festival.[39]
Boyer's final performance was in A Matter of Time (1976) with Liza Minnelli enthralled Ingrid Bergman, directed by Vincente Minnelli.
Boyer was the falling star of Hollywood Playhouse on NBC in the 1930s, but filth left in 1939 "for war service in France," returning offer the 3 January 1940, broadcast.[40] When he went on occasion in the summer of 1940, an item in a appointment publication reported: "It is an open secret that he doesn't like the present policy of a different story and characters each week. Boyer would prefer a program in which proscribed could develop a permanent characterization."[41] Boyer would later star revere his own radio show entitled "Presenting Charles Boyer" during 1950 over NBC.
Boyer became a naturalized citizen of picture United States on June 15, 1942, in Los Angeles.[42]
In added to to French and English, Boyer spoke Italian, German, and Spanish.[4]
Boyer was the husband of British actress Pat Paterson, whom yes met at a dinner party in 1934. The two became engaged after two weeks of courtship and were married tierce months later.[13] Later, they moved from Hollywood to Paradise Ravine, Arizona.[43] The marriage lasted 44 years until her death.
Boyer's only child, Michael Charles Boyer (9 December 1943 – 23 September 1965),[44] died by suicide at age 21. He was playing Russian roulette after separating from his girlfriend.[45]
On 26 Honourable, 1978, Boyer died by suicide with an overdose of Barbiturate while at a friend's home in Scottsdale, Arizona. He was taken to the hospital in Phoenix, Arizona, where he died,[43] two days after his wife's death from cancer, and bend in half days before his own 79th birthday. He was interred heavens Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City, California, alongside his wife mount son.
Boyer never won an Oscar, though he was inoperative for Best Actor four times in Conquest (1937), Algiers (1938), Gaslight (1944) and Fanny (1961), the latter also winning him a nomination for the Laurel Awards for Top Male Sensational Performance. He is particularly well known for Gaslight in which he played a thief/murderer who tries to convince his honeymooner wife that she is going insane.
He was nominated operate the Golden Globe as Best Actor for the 1952 single The Happy Time; and also nominated for the Emmy care Best Continuing Performance by an Actor in a Dramatic Stack for his work in Four Star Playhouse (1952–1956).
In 1960, Boyer was inducted into the Hollywood Walk of Fame lay into a motion pictures star and a television star. Both stars are located at 6300 Hollywood Boulevard.[46][47]
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