
Farley Granger
Active - 1943 - 2002 | Born - Jul 1, 1925 in San Jose, CA | Died - Mar 27, 2011 in New York, NY | Genres - Drama, Mystery, Crime, Romance, Thriller | Height: 6' 0"
While still a teenager Farley Granger appeared in a Los Angeles little theater production, where he was spotted by a scout. Sam Goldwyn signed him to a film contract and he debuted onscreen as a Russian youth in The North Star (1943). Typecast as a troubled pretty boy or a vulnerable, sensitive, soulful young hero, Granger appeared in one more film and then served in World War II.
After the war, he returned to the screen as an intellectual thrill-killer in Alfred Hitchcock's Rope (1948) Early predictions that Granger would become a major star failed to come true, however; his career was mismanaged and he never lived up to his potential. After making a series of minor Hollywood films, he moved to Italy in the mid '50s and made one film there, then returned to Hollywood for two more movies before giving up his screen career in favor of work on stage, doing repertory theatre and Broadway productions like The Seagull and The Glass Menagerie.
In the late '60s Granger returned to Italy and began living there for much of the year, appearing onscreen in little-known Italian productions, and returning to America less frequently to participate in American projects. He eventually played a psychiatrist and head of a family on the TV soap opera One Life to Live, but mainly specialize in horror films and thrillers as the following decades unfolded, appearing in movies like 1974's Death Will Have Your Eyes and 1985's Deathmask.
The actor enjoyed a state of semi-retirement as the years went on, however, stepping in front of the camera in the '90s and 2000s mostly as a participant in documentaries about Hollywood and Alfred Hitchcock, like 1995's The Celluloid Closet and 2001's Goldwyn: The Man and His Movies. Granger passed away in March of 2011 at the age of 85.
Available Films:
Active - 1943 - 2002 | Born - Jul 1, 1925 in San Jose, CA | Died - Mar 27, 2011 in New York, NY | Genres - Drama, Mystery, Crime, Romance, Thriller | Height: 6' 0"
While still a teenager Farley Granger appeared in a Los Angeles little theater production, where he was spotted by a scout. Sam Goldwyn signed him to a film contract and he debuted onscreen as a Russian youth in The North Star (1943). Typecast as a troubled pretty boy or a vulnerable, sensitive, soulful young hero, Granger appeared in one more film and then served in World War II.
After the war, he returned to the screen as an intellectual thrill-killer in Alfred Hitchcock's Rope (1948) Early predictions that Granger would become a major star failed to come true, however; his career was mismanaged and he never lived up to his potential. After making a series of minor Hollywood films, he moved to Italy in the mid '50s and made one film there, then returned to Hollywood for two more movies before giving up his screen career in favor of work on stage, doing repertory theatre and Broadway productions like The Seagull and The Glass Menagerie.
In the late '60s Granger returned to Italy and began living there for much of the year, appearing onscreen in little-known Italian productions, and returning to America less frequently to participate in American projects. He eventually played a psychiatrist and head of a family on the TV soap opera One Life to Live, but mainly specialize in horror films and thrillers as the following decades unfolded, appearing in movies like 1974's Death Will Have Your Eyes and 1985's Deathmask.
The actor enjoyed a state of semi-retirement as the years went on, however, stepping in front of the camera in the '90s and 2000s mostly as a participant in documentaries about Hollywood and Alfred Hitchcock, like 1995's The Celluloid Closet and 2001's Goldwyn: The Man and His Movies. Granger passed away in March of 2011 at the age of 85.
Available Films:
Trivia:
On the audio commentary for They Live by Night (1948), he says that Alfred Hitchcock and Nicholas Ray were the best directors he ever worked with. In addition, his two favorite films of his own are Hitchcock's Strangers on a Train (1951) and Ray's They Live by Night (1948).
In his book "Original Story By: A Memoir of Broadway and Hollywood," playwright and screenwriter Arthur Laurents detailed his live-in relationship with Granger during the 1940s and '50s. Laurents and Granger were already romantically involved when Laurents wrote the screenplay for Rope (1948), in which Granger co-starred.
[on leaving the Samuel Goldwyn after Hans Christian Andersen (1952)] "I finally bought my contract from him. Couldn't stand working for him anymore, and I just wanted to work in the theater for a bit. I didn't want to be a movie star. I didn't think it was my place in life. It took all the money I had in the world, and I had a wonderful agent then, Charles Feldman [Charles K. Feldman]. He got me in this movie in Italy. I was all set to come to New York and set up shop, but I did the [Luchino Visconti] movie [Senso (1954)] out of necessity. I made an awful lot of money on that one since I had signed for just three months, and it dragged on for nine."
On the audio commentary for They Live by Night (1948), he says that Alfred Hitchcock and Nicholas Ray were the best directors he ever worked with. In addition, his two favorite films of his own are Hitchcock's Strangers on a Train (1951) and Ray's They Live by Night (1948).
In his book "Original Story By: A Memoir of Broadway and Hollywood," playwright and screenwriter Arthur Laurents detailed his live-in relationship with Granger during the 1940s and '50s. Laurents and Granger were already romantically involved when Laurents wrote the screenplay for Rope (1948), in which Granger co-starred.
[on leaving the Samuel Goldwyn after Hans Christian Andersen (1952)] "I finally bought my contract from him. Couldn't stand working for him anymore, and I just wanted to work in the theater for a bit. I didn't want to be a movie star. I didn't think it was my place in life. It took all the money I had in the world, and I had a wonderful agent then, Charles Feldman [Charles K. Feldman]. He got me in this movie in Italy. I was all set to come to New York and set up shop, but I did the [Luchino Visconti] movie [Senso (1954)] out of necessity. I made an awful lot of money on that one since I had signed for just three months, and it dragged on for nine."