Robert Mitchum born August 6, 1917

Robert Charles Durman Mitchum (August 6, 1917 – July 1, 1997) was an American actor and singer. He is known for his antihero roles and film noir appearances. 

Robert Mitchum was an underrated American leading man of enormous ability, who sublimated his talents beneath an air of disinterest. He was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, to Ann Harriet (Gunderson), a Norwegian immigrant, and James Thomas Mitchum, a shipyard/railroad worker. His father died in a train accident when he was two, and Robert and his siblings (including brother John Mitchum, later also an actor) were raised by his mother and stepfather (a British army major) in Connecticut, New York, and Delaware.

An early contempt for authority led to discipline problems, and Mitchum spent good portions of his teen years adventuring on the open road. He later claimed that on one of these trips, at the age of 14, he was charged with vagrancy and sentenced to a Georgia chain gang, from which he escaped. He then spent the rest of the decade traveling across the country and taking various jobs. He participated in 27 professional boxing matches but retired from the ring after a fight that broke his nose and left a scar on his left eye.

                                     

Mitchum married Dorothy on March 16, 1940, in the kitchen of a Methodist parson in Dover, Delaware. He brought her to Los Angeles to settle down. He worked at Lockheed Aircraft, where job stress caused him to suffer temporary blindness. About this time Mitchum discovered acting in a Long Beach, California, amateur theatre company. Working a wide variety of jobs (including ghost-writer for astrologist Carroll Righter),it wasn't long before he found work as a film actor in June 1942 and began to obtain small roles in films, appearing in dozens within a very brief time.

In 1945, he was cast as Lt. Walker in Story of G.I. Joe (1945) and received an Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor. His star ascended rapidly, and he became an icon of 1940s film noir, though equally adept at westerns and romantic dramas. His apparently lazy style and seen-it-all demeanor proved highly attractive to men and women, and by the 1950s, he was a true superstar despite a brief prison term for marijuana usage in 1949, which seemed to enhance rather than diminish his "bad boy" appeal. Though seemingly dismissive of "art," he worked in tremendously artistically thoughtful projects such as Charles Laughton's The Night of the Hunter (1955) and even co-wrote and composed an oratorio produced at the Hollywood Bowl by Orson Welles.

One of the lesser-known aspects of Mitchum's career was his foray into music as a singer. Critic Greg Adams writes, "Unlike most celebrity vocalists, Robert Mitchum actually had musical talent." Frank Sinatra said of Mitchum, "For anyone who's not a professional musician, he knows more about music, from Bach to Brubeck, than any man I've ever known."Mitchum's voice was often used instead of that of a professional singer when his character sang in his films. Notable productions featuring Mitchum's own singing voice included Pursued, Rachel and the Stranger, One Minute to Zero, The Night of the Hunter, The Sundowners, and Maria's Lovers. He sang the title song to Young Billy Young and River of No Return.

Monroe & Mitchum

Mitchum recorded two albums. After hearing traditional calypso music and meeting artists such as Mighty Sparrow and Lord Melody while filming Fire Down Below and Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison in the Caribbean islands of Tobago, he recorded Calypso – is like so. On the album, released through Capitol Records in March 1957, he emulated the calypso sound and style, even adopting the style's unique pronunciations and slang. A year later, he recorded "The Ballad of Thunder Road", a song he had written for the film Thunder Road. The country-style song became a modest hit for Mitchum, reaching number 62 on the Billboard Pop Singles chart in September 1958. The song was included as a bonus track on a successful reissue of Calypso – is like so.

Although Mitchum continued to use his singing voice in his film work, he waited until 1967 to record his follow-up record, That Man, Robert Mitchum, Sings. The album, released by Nashville-based Monument Records, took him further into country music and featured songs similar to "The Ballad of Thunder Road". "Little Old Wine Drinker Me", the first single, was a top-10 hit on country radio, reaching number nine there, and crossed over into mainstream radio, where it peaked at number 96. Its follow-up, "You Deserve Each Other", also charted on the Billboard Country Singles chart. Mitchum was nominated for an Academy of Country Music Award for Most Promising Male Vocalist in 1968.

A master of accents and seemingly unconcerned about his star image, he played in both forgettable and unforgettable films with unswerving nonchalance, leading many to overlook the prodigious talent he can bring to a project that he finds compelling. He moved into television in the 1980s as his film opportunities diminished, winning new fans with The Winds of War (1983) and War and Remembrance (1988). It was during this time that he entered the Betty Ford Centre in Palm Springs, California, for treatment of alcoholism. In 1991, Mitchum was set to receive a lifetime achievement award from the National Board of Review of Motion Pictures. He rejected it, however, after learning that he would have to pay for his own transport and accommodations and accept it in person. That same year, he received the Telegatto award and, in 1992 the Cecil B. DeMille Award from the Golden Globe Awards. His last film was James Dean: Live Fast, Die Young (1997) with Casper Van Dien as James Dean.

A lifelong heavy smoker, Mitchum died in his sleep at 5 a.m. on July 1, 1997, (age 79 years) at his home in Santa Barbara, California, from complications of lung cancer and emphysema. His wife of 57 years, Dorothy, was by his side. His sons James Mitchum and Christopher Mitchum are actors, as is his grandson Bentley Mitchum.

(Edited from IMDb & Wikipedia)