He was one of the most popular swashbuckling movie stars of the 1930s and 1940s. Named after his father and great-grandfather, who were both theatrical players, his mother, Patia Power was a Shakespearean actress and a highly respected drama coach, which greatly aided him at the start in his career. He moved to California where he landed a screen test with 20th Century Fox and by 1936 he was offered a contract, Within only a year he was one of Fox’s leading stars and was paired with Alice Faye, Maureen O’Hara and Norma Shearer among many others. During World War II, he became a Marine pilot and saw action in the South Pacific. During the filming of ‘Solomon and Sheba’ in Madrid, Spain, which he also produced in 1958, he collapsed while dueling with George Sanders, and died of a heart attack before he got to the hospital, dead at the age of 44. His scenes were re-shot with the replacement star Yul Brynner in the role. His burial site in Hollywood Forever is a unique tomb in the form of a marble bench. He is only a short distance away from two other great swashbucklers of the movies: Douglas Fairbanks Sr. and Jr.
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