Richard Widmark established himself in American cinema with his debut in the 1947 film Kiss of Death (1947) in which he won a Best Supporting Actor Academy Award nomination as the killer "Tommy Udo". Kiss of Death (1947.) Widmark became a star in the post-World War II era along with fellow post-War stars Kirk Douglas and Robert Mitchum'
Widmark brought a new kind of character to the screen in his character leads and supporting parts: a hardboiled type who does not actively court the sympathy of the audience, deeply conflicted, or just down right deeply corrupt characters. After his debut, Widmark would work steadily until he retired at the age of 76 in 1990, primarily as a character lead. His stardom would peak around the time he played the U.S. prosecutor in Judgment at Nuremberg (1961) as the 1950s segued into the 1960s, but he would continue to act for another 30 years.
Widmark played psychotics in The Street with No Name (1948) and Road House (1948), and held his own against new Fox superstar Gregory Peck in the William A. Wellman's Western, Yellow Sky (1948), playing the villain, of course. When he finally pressured the studio to let him play other parts, his appearance as a sailor in Down to the Sea in Ships (1949) made headlines: "Life" magazine's March 28, 1949 issue featured a three-page spread of the movie, headlined, "Widmark the Movie Villain Goes Straight". He was popular, having captured the public imagination, and before the decade was out, his hand and foot prints were immortalized in concrete in the court outside Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood.
Elia Kazan cast Widmark in his thriller Panic in the Streets (1950) not as the heavy - that role went to Jack Palance - but as the physician who tracks down Palance, who has the plague, in tandem with detective 'Paul Douglas'. Widmark was establishing himself as a real presence in this genre.
Having proved he could handle other roles, Widmark didn't shy away from playing heavies in quality pictures. The soon-to-be-blacklisted director Jules Dassin cast him in one of his greatest roles, as the penny-ante hustler Harry Fabian in Night and the City (1950). Set in London, Widmark's Fabian manages to survive in the jungle of the English demimonde, but is doomed. Widmark was masterful in conveying the desperation of the criminal seeking to control his own fate but who is damned, and this performance also became an icon of film noir. In that same year, he appeared in Oscar-winning writer-director Joseph L. Mankiewicz's "No Way Out" as a bigot who instigates a race riot.
As the 1950s progressed, Widmark played in Westerns, military vehicles, and his old stand-by genre, the thriller. He appeared with Marilyn Monroe (this time cast as the psycho) in "Don't Bother to Knock" (1953) and made "Pick Up on South Street" that same year for director Samuel Fuller. His seven-year contract at Fox was expiring, and Zanuck - who would not renew the deal - cast him in the Western Broken Lance (1954) in a decidedly supporting role, billed beneath not only Spencer Tracy but even Robert Wagner and Jean Peters. The film was well-respected, and it won an Oscar nomination for best screenplay for the front of Hollywood 10 blacklistee Albert Maltz.
In 1961, Widmark acquitted himself quite well as the prosecutor in producer-director Stanley Kramer's "Judgment at Nuremberg" (1961), appearing with the Oscar-nominated Spencer Tracy and the Oscar-winning 'Maximilian Schell', as well as with superstar Burt Lancaster and acting genius Montgomery Clift and the legendary 'Judy Garland' (the latter two winning Oscar nods for their small roles). Despite being showcased with all this thespian-firepower, Widmark's character proved to be the axis on which the drama turned.
Im the 1970s, he continued to make his mark in movies and, beginning in 1971, in television. In movies, he appeared primarily in supporting roles, albeit in highly billed fashion, in such films as Sidney Lumet's "Murder on the Orient Express", Robert Aldrich's "Twilight's Last Gleaming", and Stanley Kramer's "The Domino Theory" (1977). He even came back as a heavy, playing the villainous doctor in "Coma" (1978). In 1971, in search of better roles, he turned to television, starring as the President of the U.S. In the TV movies " Vanished." His performance in the role brought Widmark an Emmy nomination. He resurrected the character of Madigan for NBC, in six 90-minute episodes that appeared as part of the rotation of "NBC Wednesday Mystery Movie" for the Fall 1972 season. He lived quietly and avoided the press, saying in 1971, "I think a performer should do his work and then shut up.". "
Richard Widmark was a talented actor who could play many types of roles, and I was fortunate to see many of his moviesa and also his TV series Madigan. REST IN PEACE
Richard Widmark!
Richard Widmark Passed away at 93
Tribute to Richard Widmark
Richard Widmark On Whats My Line? 1953-1954
