Stewart Granger
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Stewart Granger (6 May, 1913 – 16 August, 1993) was an English film actor, mainly associated with heroic and romantic leading roles.
He was born in London, his real name being James Lablanche Stewart. He was obliged to change it in order not to be confused with the famous American actor James Maitland Stewart. As Granger reported in an interview once, his off-screen friends called him "Jimmy".
In 1933, he made his first film appearance as an extra. His first starring role was in the Gainsborough period melodrama The Man in Grey (1943), a film that helped to make him a huge star in Britain. In the early 1950s he moved to Hollywood and starred in a number of swashbucklers and other adventure films.
In 1938, he married the actress, Elspeth March. After ten years of marriage and two children, he was divorced and soon afterwards married another actress, Jean Simmons, with whom he had starred in Adam and Evelyne.
In 1956, Granger became a naturalized citizen of the United States.
In Germany Granger acted in the role of Old Surehand in three western-movies made after novels by German author Karl May, with French actor Pierre Brice (in the role of the fictional red Indian-chief Winnetou), in "Unter Geiern" (Frontier Hellcat) (1964), "Der Ölprinz" (Rampage at Apache Wells) (1965) and "Old Surehand" (Flaming Frontier) (1965).
With Pierre Brice and Lex Barker, who was also a Karl-May-movie hero, he was united in the movie "Gern hab' ich die Frauen gekillt" (Killer's Carnival) (1966). In the German Edgar Wallace-movie series of the 1960's he was to be seen in "The Trygon Factor" (1966). Towards the end of his career Granger even starred in a German soap-opera called "Das Erbe der Guldenburgs" (The Guldenburg heritage) (1987).
Divorcing from Jean Simmons after ten years and a daughter, he married for a third time and had another child.
He died in Santa Monica, California, of cancer.
Selected films
- The Man in Grey (1943)
- Madonna of the Seven Moons (1944)
- Love Story (1944)
- Waterloo Road (1944), with John Mills
- Caesar and Cleopatra (1945), with Claude Rains
- Captain Boycott (1947)
- Saraband for Dead Lovers (1948), with Joan Greenwood
- Adam and Evelyne (1949)
- King Solomon's Mines (1950) as Allan Quartermain
- Scaramouche (1952), with Mel Ferrer
- The Prisoner of Zenda (1952), with Deborah Kerr
- All the Brothers Were Valiant (1953), with Robert Taylor
- Beau Brummell (1954), with Elizabeth Taylor and Peter Ustinov
- Moonfleet (1955) by Fritz Lang
- Green Fire (1955)
- Footsteps in the Fog (1956)
- Bhowani Junction (1956)
- North to Alaska (1960)
- Sodom and Gomorrah (1962) by Robert Aldrich
- The Hound of the Baskervilles (1972) (TV) as Sherlock Holmes
- The Wild Geese (1978), with Richard Burton, Roger Moore and Hardy Krüger