Post by snsurone on Aug 1, 2018 18:34:27 GMT
He was first noticed as a "fruity tenor" (whatever the hell that means) in those great WB musicals directed by Busby Berkeley.
His romantic interest in those movies was dancer Ruby Keeler.
Then, in the 1940's, the direction of his career veered sharply to non-singing dramatic roles, such as Philip Marlow in MURDER, MY SWEET and the frustrated screen writer in THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL.
Later on, he turned to directing in such movies as THE CONQUEROR, which was filmed close to a nuclear bomb test site.
It has been long supposed that the radioactive fallout of these tests was the cause of the cancer that killed Powell in 1963, along with John Wayne, Susan Hayward, Agnes Moorehead, and Pedro Armiteraz (sp?), who committed suicide when he learned he had the fatal disease.
He also hosted the TV anthology series THE DICK POWELL THEATER not long before his death.
IMHO, he was a good, albeit not a great actor (Bogie was more effective as Marlow in THE BIG SLEEP).
But he did have a beautiful singing voice,
What do you think?
His romantic interest in those movies was dancer Ruby Keeler.
Then, in the 1940's, the direction of his career veered sharply to non-singing dramatic roles, such as Philip Marlow in MURDER, MY SWEET and the frustrated screen writer in THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL.
Later on, he turned to directing in such movies as THE CONQUEROR, which was filmed close to a nuclear bomb test site.
It has been long supposed that the radioactive fallout of these tests was the cause of the cancer that killed Powell in 1963, along with John Wayne, Susan Hayward, Agnes Moorehead, and Pedro Armiteraz (sp?), who committed suicide when he learned he had the fatal disease.
He also hosted the TV anthology series THE DICK POWELL THEATER not long before his death.
IMHO, he was a good, albeit not a great actor (Bogie was more effective as Marlow in THE BIG SLEEP).
But he did have a beautiful singing voice,
What do you think?