Robert Montgomery (1904-1981)

He appeared in a total of 34 Pre-Code movies between 1929 and 1934, and continued in major motion pictures through 1960. He was also the host of his own television programme ‘Robert Montgomery Presents’ (1950-1957). He is well known for his roles as the weak-willed prisoner “Kent” in George Hill’s Pre-Code early prison drama ‘The Big House’ (1930), also starring Chester Morris, Wallace Beery, and Lewis Stone. He was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor twice, for the role of the psychotic character “Danny” in Richard Thorpe’s ‘Night Must Fall’ (1937), also starring Rosalind Russell and Dame May Whitty in her Hollywood movie debut at age 72, and as the boxer “Joe” mistakenly sent to Heaven in Alexander Hall’s fantasy romantic comedy ‘Here Comes Mr. Jordan’ (1941), also starring Claude Rains, Evelyn Keyes, Edward Everett Horton, and James Gleason. This movie was remade in 1978 by Warren Beatty as ‘Heaven Can Wait’ (1978), the same name as the 1938 play both movies were based on. Robert Montgomery is photographed here with his daughter Elizabeth Montgomery, who is known to just about every baby boomer as “Samantha Stephens” on the television programme series ‘Bewitched’ (1964-1972).