Description
Correspondence, drafts, research notes,
photographs, audiotaped interviews, newspaper and film magazine clippings,
videotapes, and miscellaneous graphic materials produced and collected by Allan
R. Ellenberger in the course of researching his biography of film actor and
silent screen romantic idol Ramon Novarro (1899-1968), published in 1999 as
Ramon Novarro; A Biography of the Silent Film
Idol, 1899-1968; With a Filmography
.
Background
Ramon Novarro was born Jose Ramon Gil Samaniego in Durango, Mexico, on
February 6, 1899, the second son of a wealthy dentist. He evidenced an interest
in acting and singing early in his life, and in 1915, with the grudging consent
of his parents, moved to Los Angeles with his brother Mariano to pursue a music
career. To support himself, he took jobs as a model and singing waiter. In 1917
he broke into films as an extra; he further developed his acting skills with a
stint in vaudeville. The first film in which he received billing was
Mr. Barnes of New York, directed by Victor
Schertzinger and released in June 1922; however, the role that launched his
career was the character of Rupert of Hentzau in
The Prisoner of Zenda, directed by Rex
Ingram and released in July 1922. Ingram, who had first directed Novarro as an
extra in the 1921 film
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, which
starred Rudolph Valentino, became Novarro's mentor, directing him in his next
three next films: the romantic drama
Trifling Women (1922), the melodrama
Where the Pavement Ends (1923), and the
historical romance
Scaramouche (1923). By the end of 1922,
Novarro's studio, Metro (later to become Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer), was touting
Novarro as the next Valentino. Novarro reached the pinnacle of his career in
the title role in the monumental production of
Ben-Hur, directed by Fred Niblo and released
on December 30, 1925, although he gave a better performance the following year
in Ernst Lubitsch's
The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg. With
Valentino's death in 1926, Novarro became the leading romantic idol of
Hollywood silent films, although his fame never quite matched that of his
predecessor. Although Novarro had a high-pitched speaking voice, his career
survived the transition to sound, and his later films increasingly took
advantage of his musical training and pleasant singing voice. He also worked
behind the camera, directing the Spanish and French versions of
Call of the Flesh (1930) in which he also
starred. Novarro continued playing romantic leads into the early 1930s,
starring opposite Greta Garbo in
Mata Hari (1931), Myrna Loy in
The Barbarian (1933), and Jeanette MacDonald
in
The Cat and the Fiddle (1934). Age began to
take its toll, however, despite his desperate attempt to look youthful in his
early talkies. He left Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1935, and later became a parody
of his earlier self in such films as
The Sheik Steps Out (1937). His last
starring role in an English-language film was in
A Desperate Adventure (1938). He starred in
two foreign-language films, in 1940 and 1944, and between 1949 and 1960
appeared in character parts in five films. In the 1950s and 1960s, he also
appeared in character parts in several television series, including
Walt Disney Presents (1958),
Combat (1964 and 1965),
Dr. Kildare (1964),
Bonanza (1965),
The Wild Wild West (1967), and
High Chaparral (1968). He also appeared in
theater, including ten performances of
A Royal Exchange, at His Majesty's Theatre,
London, in 1935, and two preview performances of
Infidel Caesar, on Broadway, in 1962.