Ronald Colman

DOB: 1891-02-08

DOD: 1958-05-19

British leading man of primarily American films, one of the great stars of the Golden Age. Raised in Ealing, the son of a successful silk merchant, he attended boarding school in Sussex, where he first discovered amateur theatre. He intended to attend Cambridge and become an engineer, but his father's death cost him the financial support necessary. He joined the London Scottish Regionals and at the outbreak of World War I was sent to France. Seriously wounded at the battle of Messines--he was gassed--he was invalided out of service scarcely two months after shipping out for France. Upon his recovery he tried to enter the consular service, but a chance encounter got him a small role in a London play. He dropped other plans and concentrated on the theatre, and was rewarded with a succession of increasingly prominent parts. He made extra money appearing in a few minor films, and in 1920 set out for New York in hopes of finding greater fortune there than in war-depressed England. After two years of impoverishment he was cast in a Broadway hit, "La Tendresse". Director Henry King spotted him in the show and cast him as Lillian Gish's leading man in The White Sister (1923). His success in the film led to a contract with Samuel Goldwyn, and his career as a Hollywood leading man was underway. He became a vastly popular star of silent films, in romances as well as adventure films. The coming of sound made his extraordinarily beautiful speaking voice even more important to the film industry. He played sophisticated, thoughtful characters of integrity with enormous aplomb, and swashbuckled expertly when called to do so in films like The Prisoner of Zenda (1937). A decade later he received an Academy Award for his splendid portrayal of a tormented actor in A Double Life (1947). Much of his later career was devoted to "The Halls of Ivy", a radio show that later was transferred to television "The Halls of Ivy" (1954). He continued to work until nearly the end of his life, which came in 1958 after a brief lung illness. He was survived by his second wife, actress Benita Hume, and their daughter Juliet Benita Colman.

Starred In

1937
Movie

Lost Horizon

1942
Movie

Random Harvest

1947
Movie

A Double Life

1944
Movie

Kismet

1929
Movie

Bulldog Drummond

1923
Movie

The White Sister

1924
Movie

Romola

1931
Movie

Arrowsmith

1936
Movie

Under Two Flags

1931
Movie

The Unholy Garden

1930
Movie

The Devil to Pay!

1935
Movie

Clive of India

1929
Movie

Condemned!

1930
Movie

Raffles

1925
Movie

Stella Dallas

1938
Movie

If I Were King

1940
Movie

Lucky Partners

1932
Movie

Cynara

1927
Movie

The Magic Flame

1926
Movie

Beau Geste

1933
Movie

The Masquerader

1929
Movie

The Rescue

1928
Movie

Two Lovers

1926
Movie

Kiki

1927
Movie

The Night of Love

1925
Movie

The Sporting Venus

1925
Movie

The Dark Angel

1925
Movie

His Supreme Moment

1949
Movie

The Art Director

1919
Movie

The Toilers

1924
Movie

Tarnish