Mel Ferrer

Melchor Gastón Ferrer[1][2] (August 25, 1917 – June 2, 2008) was an American screen actor, who scored notable hits with Scaramouche, Lili and Knights of the Round Table, before playing opposite his then-wife, Audrey Hepburn, in War and Peace. He was also a director and producer on stage, screen and television.

Mel Ferrer
Ferrer in 1960
Born	Melchor Gastón Ferrer (1917-08-25)August 25, 1917 Elberon, New Jersey, U.S.
Died	June 2, 2008(2008-06-02) (aged 90) Santa Barbara, California, U.S.
Occupation	Actor, director, producer
Years active	1937–1998
Spouse(s)	Frances Pilchard ​ ( m. 1937; div. 1939) Barbara C. Tripp ​ ( m. 1940; div. 1944) Frances Pilchard ​ ( m. 1944; div. 1954) Audrey Hepburn ​ ( m. 1954; div. 1968) Elizabeth Soukhotine ( m. after 1971)
Children	6
Relatives	Emma Ferrer (granddaughter)
Awards	Walk of Fame 6240 Hollywood Blvd

Early life

Mel Ferrer was born in the Elberon, New Jersey of Spanish and Irish descent. His father, Dr. José María Ferrer (December 3, 1856 - 1920),[2] was born in Havana, Cuba, of Spanish (Catalan) ancestry,[3][4] and was an authority on pneumonia and served as chief of staff of St. Vincent's Hospital in New York City. He was 60 years old at the time of Mel's birth and died three years later.[5] Mel Ferrer's U.S.-born mother, Mary Matilda Irene (née O'Donohue; 1878–1967),[6] was a daughter of coffee broker Joseph J. O'Donohue, New York's City Commissioner of Parks, a founder of the Coffee Exchange, and a founder of the Brooklyn-New York Ferry. An ardent opponent of Prohibition, Irene Ferrer (as she was known) was named in 1934 as the New York State chairman of the Citizens Committee for Sane Liquor Laws.[7] His parents married on October 17, 1910 in New York.[2]

His mother's family, the O'Donohues, were prominent Roman Catholics. Mel Ferrer's aunt, Marie Louise O'Donohue, was named a papal countess,[8] and his mother's sister, Teresa Riley O'Donohue, a leading figure in American Roman Catholic charities and welfare organizations, was granted permission by Pope Pius XI to install a private chapel in her New York City apartment.[9]

Ferrer had three siblings. His elder sister, Dr. María Irené Ferrer (July 30, 1915 – November 12, 2004), was a cardiologist and educator, who helped refine the cardiac catheter and electrocardiogram.[10] She died in 2004 in Manhattan, New York at age 89 of pneumonia and congestive heart failure. His brother, Dr. Jose M. Ferrer (November 23, 1912 – December 1982),[2][2] was a surgeon; he died at age 70 from complications of abdominal surgery. His younger sister, Teresa Ferrer (March 30, 1919 – February 12, 2002), was the religion editor of The New York Herald Tribune and an education editor for Newsweek. She died at age 82 from a thoracic aneurysm.[7][11]

Ferrer was privately educated at the Bovée School in New York (one of his classmates was the future author Louis Auchincloss) and Canterbury Prep School in Connecticut, then attended Princeton University until his sophomore year, at which time he dropped out to devote more time to acting. He worked as an editor of a small Vermont newspaper and wrote the children's book Tito's Hats (Garden City Publishing, 1940).[12]

Career

Audrey Hepburn and Mel Ferrer on the set of War and Peace in 1955

Early theatre work

Ferrer began acting in summer stock as a teenager and in 1937 won the Theatre Intime award for best new play by a Princeton undergraduate; the play was called Awhile to Work and co-starred another college student, Frances Pilchard, who would become Ferrer's first wife later the same year.[13] At age twenty-one, he was appearing on the Broadway stage as a chorus dancer, making his debut there as an actor two years later. He appeared as a chorus dancer in two unsuccessful musicals, Cole Porter's You Never Know and Everywhere I Roam. After a bout with polio, Ferrer worked as a disc jockey in Texas and Arkansas and moved to Mexico to work on the novel Tito's Hat (published 1940).

His first acting roles were in a revival of Kind Lady (1940) and Cue for Passion (1940).[14][15]

Columbia Pictures

Ferrer was contracted to Columbia Pictures as a director, along with several other "potentials" who began as dialogue directors: Fred Sears, William Castle, Henry Levin and Robert Gordon.[16]

Among the films he worked on were Louisiana Hayride (1944), They Live in Fear (1944), Sergeant Mike (1944), Together Again (1944), Meet Miss Bobby Socks (1944), Let's Go Steady (1944), Ten Cents a Dance (1945), and A Thousand and One Nights (1945). Some of these were "B" movies but others (Thousand and One Nights) were more prestigious. Ferrer directed The Girl of the Limberlost (1945), starring Ruth Nelson.

Broadway

Eventually, he returned to Broadway, where he starred in Strange Fruit (1945–46), a play based on the novel by Lillian Smith. It was directed by José Ferrer (no relation). He directed José Ferrer (no relation) in the 1946 stage production of Cyrano de Bergerac.[17] He worked as an assistant on The Fugitive (1947), directed by John Ford in Mexico. Along with Gregory Peck, Dorothy McGuire and Joseph Cotten, he founded the La Jolla Playhouse in San Diego.

Screen actor

Ferrer made his screen acting debut with a starring role in Lost Boundaries (1949), playing a black person who passes for white. The film was controversial but much acclaimed.[18]

Howard Hughes' RKO Studios

Ferrer had a supporting role in Born to Be Bad (1950) at RKO, directed by Nicholas Ray. At that studio, he directed Claudette Colbert in The Secret Fury (1950) and directed or co-directed Vendetta (1950), The Racket (1951) and Macao (1952). He starred as a bullfighter in The Brave Bulls (1951) for Robert Rossen at Columbia. Ferrer fought with Arthur Kennedy over Marlene Dietrich in Rancho Notorious (1952), directed by Fritz Lang at RKO.

MGM

Ferrer went to MGM, replacing Fernando Lamas as the villain in Scaramouche (1952). The film, particularly notable for a long, climactic swordfight between Ferrer and Stewart Granger, was a huge hit. The studio kept him on for Lili (1953) as the title character (played by Leslie Caron)'s love interest. It was another big success; Ferrer and Caron also got a hit single out of it, "Hi-Lili-Hi-Lo". Saadia (1953), which Ferrer made with Cornel Wilde, was a flop, but Knights of the Round Table (1954), in which Ferrer played King Arthur, was another hit. Ferrer met actress Audrey Hepburn at a party; she wanted to do a play together. They appeared in Ondine (1954) on Broadway and wed in 1954.

Europe

Ferrer went to Italy to make Proibito (1954) and to England for Oh... Rosalinda!! (1955), directed by Powell and Pressburger. Neither film was widely seen, but War and Peace (1956) was a big success; Ferrer played Prince Andrei, co-starring with then-wife Audrey Hepburn. In France, he co-starred with Ingrid Bergman in Elena and Her Men (1956), directed by Jean Renoir.

United States

Ferrer and Hepburn made Mayerling (1957) for American television; it was released theatrically in some countries. Ferrer returned to MGM to make The Vintage (1957) with Pier Angeli, which was a big flop. He made two films for 20th Century Fox: an all-star adaptation of The Sun Also Rises (1957) and Fräulein (1958), a war story with Dana Wynter. At MGM, he played one of the last three people on Earth in The World, the Flesh and the Devil (1959), another flop. Ferrer went to Italy to star in Roger Vadim's vampire movie Blood and Roses (1960). After an English horror film, The Hands of Orlac (1960), he starred in the Italian adventure film Charge of the Black Lancers (1962). He was one of several stars in The Devil and the Ten Commandments (1962) and The Longest Day (1962). He had a cameo in his wife's Paris When It Sizzles (1964) and was Marcus Aurelius Cleander in The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964).

Television

Ferrer then turned to television, doing some directing for the series The Farmer's Daughter (1963–66) starring Inger Stevens, William Windom, and Cathleen Nesbitt. Ferrer had a supporting role in Sex and the Single Girl (1964). From 1981-84, he appeared opposite Jane Wyman as Angela Channing's attorney (and briefly her husband), Phillip Erikson, on Falcon Crest (as well as directing several episodes). He played a blackmailing reporter in the Columbo episode "Requiem for a Fallen Star", starring Anne Baxter. He appeared opposite Cyd Charisse in an episode of the long-running Angela Lansbury series, Murder She Wrote, and appeared in two television miniseries, Peter the Great (1986) and Dream West (1986). Later credits include Eye of the Widow (1991) and Catherine the Great (1995).

Producer

Ferrer produced and starred in the biopic El Greco (1966), playing the famous painter. He also produced Wait Until Dark (1967), starring his wife, another big hit.

He and Hepburn divorced in 1968.[19]

1970s

Ferrer was mostly a jobbing actor in the 1970s, working much in Italy. Among his credits were A Time for Loving (1972); The Antichrist (1974) in Italy; Brannigan (1974), a crime drama set in London that starred John Wayne; Silent Action (1975) and The Suspicious Death of a Minor (1975), both for Sergio Martino; The Net (1975), shot in Germany; The Black Corsair (1976), an Italian swashbuckler; Gangbuster (1977) in Italy; The Pyjama Girl Case (1977); Seagulls Fly Low (1977).

In the U.S., he was in Hi-Riders (1978), The Norseman (1978), Guyana: Crime of the Century (1979), and The Fifth Floor (1979). In 1979, he portrayed Dr. Brogli in an episode of Return of the Saint. In Europe, he was in The Visitor (1979), Island of the Fishmen (1980), Nightmare City (1980), The Great Alligator River (1980) and Eaten Alive! (1980). He went to Germany for Lili Marleen (1981). He worked in two of Spanish actress Marisol's film vehicles: Cabriola and La chica del molino rojo, being the director of the first and acting in the second.

For his contributions to the motion picture industry, Mel Ferrer has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6268 Hollywood Blvd.

Personal life

Ferrer married five times, to four women, with whom he had six children. His wives were:

1. Frances Gunby Pilchard, his first and third wife, an actress who became a sculptor.[20] They married in 1937, and divorced in 1939 after having one child together, who died before their divorce.[21][22]
2. Barbara C. Tripp, they married in 1940 and later divorced. They had two children: daughter Mela Ferrer (born 1943) and son Christopher Ferrer (born 1944).
3. Frances Gunby Pilchard, for the 2nd time; they remarried in 1944, and divorced in 1953, after having two more children together: Pepa Philippa Ferrer (born 1941, conceived during his marriage with Tripp) and Mark Young Ferrer (born 1944).
4. Audrey Hepburn, to whom he was married from 1954 until 1968. They had one son, Sean Hepburn Ferrer (born 1960).
5. Elizabeth Soukhotine, from Belgium, to whom he was married from 1971 to his death in 2008.[21]

Before his marriage to Elizabeth Soukhotine in 1971, Ferrer had a relationship with 29-year-old interior designer Tessa Kennedy.[23][24]

Death

A resident of Carpinteria, California, Ferrer died of heart failure at a convalescent home in Santa Barbara, California on June 2, 2008, aged 90.[17]

Filmography

Actor

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1947	The Fugitive	Father Serra	Uncredited
1949	Lost Boundaries	Scott Mason Carter
1950	Born to Be Bad	Gobby
1951	The Brave Bulls	Luis Bello
1952	Rancho Notorious	Frenchy Fairmont
1952	Scaramouche	Noel, Marquis de Maynes
1953	Lili	Paul Berthalet
1953	Knights of the Round Table	King Arthur
1953	Saadia	Henrik
1954	Proibito	Don Paolo Salinas
1955	Oh... Rosalinda!!	Capt. Alfred Westerman
1956	War and Peace	Prince Andrei Bolkonsky
1956	Elena and Her Men	Le comte Henri de Chevincourt	a.k.a. Paris Does Strange Things
1957	The Vintage	Giancarlo Barandero
1957	The Sun Also Rises	Robert Cohn
1958	Fräulein	Maj. Foster MacLain
1959	The World, the Flesh and the Devil	Benson Thacker
1960	Blood and Roses	Leopoldo De Karnstein
1960	L'Homme à femmes	Georges Gauthier
1960	The Hands of Orlac	Stephen Orlac
1961	Love, Freedom and Treachery	Mirko
1962	Charge of the Black Lancers	Andrea Di Tula
1962	The Devil and the Ten Commandments	Philip Allan	(segment "Luxurieux point ne seras")
1962	The Longest Day	Maj. General Robert Haines	He was originally signed to play the role of General James M. Gavin, but withdrew from the role due to a scheduling conflict.[25]
1962	Marco Polo		Unfinished film
1963	Charade	Man Smoking Cigarette in Nightclub	Uncredited
1964	Paris When It Sizzles	Costume Party Jekyll & Hyde	Uncredited
1964	The Fall of the Roman Empire	Cleander
1964	Sex and the Single Girl	Rudy
1964	Who Are My Own	Juan Bautista de La Salle	a.k.a. El señor de La Salle
1966	El Greco	El Greco (Domenico Teotocopulo)
1967	Wait Until Dark	French-Canadian Radio Speaker (voice)	Uncredited
1972	A Time for Loving	Dr. Harrison
1973	The Girl from the Red Cabaret	Dalton Harvey
1974	The Antichrist	Massimo Oderisi
1975	Brannigan	Fields
1975	Silent Action	District Attorney Mannino
1975	The Suspicious Death of a Minor	Police superintendent
1975	The Net	Aurelio Morelli
1976	Eaten Alive	Harvey Wood
1976	The Black Corsair	Van Gould
1977	Gangbuster	Peseti, the Boss
1978	Seagulls Fly Low	Roberto Micheli
1978	The Pyjama Girl Case	Professor Henry Douglas
1978	Hi-Riders	Sheriff
1978	The Norseman	King Eurich
1978	Zwischengleis	Colonel Stone	a.k.a. Yesterday's Tomorrow
1978	The Fifth Floor	Dr. Sidney Coleman
1978	L'immoralità	Vera's husband
1979	Screamers	Radcliffe (US version)	a.k.a. Island of the Fishmen
1979	The Visitor	Dr. Walker
1979	Guyana: Crime of the Century		Uncredited
1979	The Great Alligator River	Joshua
1980	Eaten Alive!	Professor Carter	a.k.a. Doomed to Die
1980	Nightmare City	General Murchison
1981	Lili Marleen	David Mendelsson
1981	Vultures on the City	Sheriff
1982	A Thousand Billion Dollars	Cornelius A. Woeagen
1982	Deadly Game	Stephan Mathiesen
1984	A Soft Sunset	Franz Bollenstein
1991	Eye of the Widow	Frankenheimer the CIA chief

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1953–1954	Omnibus	Chairman of the Board / Jeff Talbot	2 episodes
1957	Producers' Showcase	Crown Prince Rudolph	Episode: "Mayerling"
1957	ITV Play of the Week		Episode: "Lost Boundaries"
1959	Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theatre	Marshal Monty Elstrode	Episode: "The Ghost"
1959	Rendezvous		Episode: "London in the Spring"
1963	Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre	Peter Carrington	Episode: "The Fifth Passenger"
1973	Columbo	Jerry Parks	Episode: "Requiem for a Falling Star"
1973	Carola	Gen. Franz von Clodius	Television film
1973	Tenafly	Charlie Rush	Episode: "Pilot"
1973	Search	John Rickman	Episode: "Suffer My Child"
1974	Police Story	Dr. Ross	Episode: "Wyatt Earp Syndrome"
1974	Marcus Welby, M.D.	Carlo	Episode: "Designs"
1976	Ellery Queen	Brandon Childs	Episode: "The Adventure of the Disappearing Dagger"
1976	Origins of the Mafia	Armando Della Morra	Episode: "La legge"
1977	Hawaii Five-O	Emil Radick / Father Neill	2 episodes
1977	Baretta	Alex Kramer	Episode: "Everybody Pays the Fare"
1977	The Fantastic Journey	Appolonius	Episode: "Funhouse"
1977	Lanigan's Rabbi	Mike Rushmore	Episode: "In Hot Weather, the Crime Rate Soars"
1977	Wonder Woman	Fritz Gerlich	Episode: "Anschluss '77"
1977	Logan's Run	Analog	Episode: "Man Out of Time"
1977	Sharon: Portrait of a Mistress	David	Television film
1978	Black Beauty	Nicholas Skinner	Television miniseries
1978	How the West Was Won	Hale Burton	3 episodes
1978	The Return of Captain Nemo	Dr. Robert Cook	Television film
1979	Return of the Saint	Dr. Paolo Brogli	Episode: "Vicious Circle"
1979	Eischied		Episode: "Who Is the Missing Woman?"
1979–1980	Dallas	Harrison Page	2 episodes
1980	Top of the Hill	Andreas Heggener	Television film
1980	Hagen	Poole	Episode: "The Straw Man"
1980	The Memory of Eva Ryker	Dr. Sanford	Television film
1980	Fugitive Family	Anthony Durano	Television film
1981	Behind the Screen	Evan Hammer	Episode: "Pilot"
1981–1984	Falcon Crest	Phillip Erikson	54 episodes
1982	Fantasy Island	Moriarity / Lord Collingwood	Episode: "The Case Against Mr. Roarke/Save Sherlock Holmes"
1982	One Shoe Makes It Murder	Carl Charnock	Television film
1984	Finder of Lost Loves	George Matthews	Episode: "Forgotten Melodies"
1985	Seduced	Arthur Orloff	Television film
1985	Hotel	Garrett Hardy / Anthony Palandrini	2 episodes
1985	The Love Boat	Jack Powers	2 episodes
1985	Glitter		Episode: "Nightfall"
1985–1989	Murder, She Wrote	Miles Austin / Eric Brahm	2 episodes
1986	Peter the Great	Frederick	Television miniseries
1986	Outrage!	Judge Michael Lengel	Television film
1986	Dream West	Judge Elkins	Television miniseries
1989	Wild Jack		Television miniseries
1989–1990	Christine Cromwell	Doctor	4 episodes
1995	Catherine the Great	Patriarch	Television film
1998	Stories from My Childhood	Geppetto (voice)	Episode: "Pinocchio and the Golden Key"

Director

Year	Title	Notes
1945	The Girl of the Limberlost
1947	The Fugitive	Directorial assistant
1950	The Secret Fury
1950	Vendetta	Uncredited
1951	The Racket	Uncredited
1952	Macao	Uncredited
1959	Green Mansions
1965	Cabriola

Dialogue coach

Year	Title	Notes
1944	Louisiana Hayride
1944	They Live in Fear
1944	Sergeant Mike
1944	Together Again
1944	Meet Miss Bobby Socks
1945	Let's Go Steady
1945	Ten Cents a Dance
1945	Boston Blackie's Rendezvous
1945	A Thousand and One Nights

Radio

Year	Program	Episode/source
1952	Family Theater	Hound of Heaven[26]
1953	Radio Theater	Undercurrent[27]

References

1. Some sources spell his first name as MELCHIOR but this is incorrect based on Ferrer's records at Princeton University. Also he was named for his paternal grandfather, Melchor Ferrer. And the name MELCHOR G. FERRER was used on the cover of Tito's Hats, a children's book that Ferrer wrote in 1940.
2. "Ancestry Library Edition". ancestrylibrary.proquest.com.
3. "MEL FERRER, TV actor, Producer and Film director". thecubanhistory.com/. January 12, 2017.
4. "Biography of Mel Ferrer (1917-2008)". TheBiography. 2018.
5. "Dr. Jose M. Ferrer", Obituaries, The New York Times, February 24, 1920.
6. "Weddings: Ferrer-O'Donohue", The New York Times, October 19, 1910.
7. "Mrs. J.M. Ferrer, Civic Leader, 89", The New York Times, February 21, 1967.
8. "Joseph O'Donohue, Real Estate Man, Dead", The New York Times, October 31, 1937.
9. "Teresa O'Donohue, Charities Worker", The New York Times, August 18, 1937.
10. "Changing the Face of Medicine | M. IrenéFerrer". cfmedicine.nlm.nih.gov.
11. "Terry Ferrer, 82, Education Editor", The New York Times, April 1, 2002.
12. The book's illustrations were by Jean Charlot.
13. "M.G. Ferrer Wins Prize Play Award", The New York Times, March 3, 1937, p. 27
14. "Kind Lady". Internet Broadway Database. Archived from the original on April 16, 2018. Retrieved November 16, 2017.
15. "Cue for Passion". Internet Broadway Database. Archived from the original on July 8, 2019. Retrieved November 16, 2017.
16. Tom Weaver (April 29, 2008). "Katz-mania". Films of the Golden Age.
17. Thomas, Bob (June 3, 2008). "Mel Ferrer, actor-director, husband of Audrey Hepburn, dies". Yahoo! News.
18. Margaret Lilliard (July 25, 1989). "Landmark '49 Film About Family Passing for White Recalled". Los Angeles Times.
19. Miller, Julie. "Audrey Hepburn Reveals Heartbreak and Discusses Secret Wedding in Never-Before-Seen Letters". Vanity Fair. Retrieved May 15, 2020.
20. "Catharsis", Time, February 10, 1941
21. Bergan, Ronald (June 5, 2008). "Obituary: Mel Ferrer". The Guardian. Retrieved February 3, 2018.
22. Audrey Hepburn - Barry Paris (Book).
23. Paris, Barry (2001). Audrey Hepburn. pp. 247–248. ISBN 0-425-18212-6.
24. Cawthorne, Nigel. Sex Lives of the Hollywood Goddesses Part 2. p. 271. ISBN 1-85375-514-1.
25. Notre jour le plus long La Presse de la Manche 2012
26. Kirby, Walter (April 20, 1952). "Better Radio Programs for the Week". The Decatur Daily Review. p. 46. Retrieved May 9, 2015 – via Newspapers.com.
27. Kirby, Walter (November 29, 1953). "Better Radio Programs for the Week". The Decatur Daily Review. p. 50. Retrieved July 14, 2015 – via Newspapers.com.

External links

• Mel Ferrer, a Reluctant Movie Star, Dies at 90
• Mel Ferrer on IMDb
• Mel Ferrer at the TCM Movie Database