Monday, October 27, 2008

Cinematic Crush: Rock Hudson

Crush object: Rock Hudson, actor.

- Born Roy Harold Scherer Jr. in 1925, he would go on to become "Rock Hudson", one of the most popular movie stars of the 1950's and 60's. But his screen beginnings were not quite auspicious: legend has it that it took 38 takes before he could successfully deliver his one line in his film debut Fighter Squadron.

- His first major successes were opposite Jane Wyman in the Douglas Sirk melodramas Magnificent Obsession and All That Heaven Allows, followed by his one and only Academy Award nomination, for George Stevens' Giant.

- He closed out the 50's by starring with Doris Day in the first of their popular romantic comedies, Pillow Talk; they would re-team for Lover Come Back and Send Me No Flowers.

- In the 70's and 80's, he turned mostly to television, most notably with his hit crime fighter series McMillan & Wife and the mini-series version of Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles. His final screen role before his headline making death in 1985 of AIDS related causes was on the nighttime soap opera Dynasty.

- Other classic movies in his filmography include Written on the Wind, A Farewell to Arms, Seconds, Ice Station Zebra, Darling Lili and The Mirror Crack'd.

See more pictures of Rock Hudson in The Back Room (NSFW).

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