Tab Hunter

 Tab Hunter, born Arthur Andrew Kelm (July 11, 1931 – July 8, 2018)

He starred in more than 40 films and was a well-known Hollywood star of the 1950s and 1960s. Hunter's first film role was a minor part in a film noir, The Lawless (1950). He was friends with character actor Paul Guilfoyle, who suggested him to director Stuart Heisler, who was looking for an unknown to play the lead in Island of Desire (1952) opposite Linda Darnell. His breakthrough role came when he was cast as the young Marine Danny in 1955's World War II drama Battle Cry. His character has an affair with an older woman, but ends up marrying the girl next door. It was based on a bestseller by Leon Uris and became Warner Bros largest grossing film of that year, cementing Hunter's position as one of Hollywood's top young romantic leads. Hunter was Warner Bros.' most popular male star from 1955 until 1959. Hunter had a 1957 hit record with the song "Young Love," which was No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for six weeks. It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc by the RIAA. He had the hit, "Ninety-Nine Ways," which peaked at No. 11 in the US and No. 5 in the UK.

His success prompted Jack L. Warner to enforce the actor's contract with the Warner Bros. studio by banning Dot Records, the label for which Hunter had recorded the single (and which was owned by rival Paramount Pictures), from releasing a follow-up album he had recorded for them. He established Warner Bros. Records specifically for Hunter. Hunter starred in the 1958 musical film Damn Yankees, in which he played Joe Hardy of Washington, D.C.'s American League baseball club. The film had originally been a Broadway show, but Hunter was the only one in the film version who had not appeared in the original cast. He starred in such films as That Kind of Woman (1959), Operation Bikini (1963) and Man With Two Faces (1964), but then the countercultural '60s had arrived, and Hunter's teen-idol image went out of fashion.

His career was also put in jeopardy after Confidential magazine published a story about how he had been arrested at a party attended by gay people shortly after he arrived in Hollywood. "If I had come out during my acting career in the 1950s, I would not have had a career," Hunter said in an October 2017 interview. Even as the studio was sponsoring "Win a Date With Tab Hunter" contests, Hunter was keeping his sexual orientation a secret while being seen in public with the likes of Wood, Sophia Loren and Debbie Reynolds. He said "I never mentioned my sexuality to Warner Bros. at all, and they never mentioned it to me, thank God." He did have a serious relationship with Anthony Perkins, however. He also appeared on such shows as Burke's Law, The Virginian, Cannon, McMillan & Wife, The Six Million Dollar Man, Ellery Queen, The Love Boat, Benson and Masquerade.

Hunter died on July 8 from a blood clot, days shy of his next birthday. He is buried at Santa Barbara Cemetery in Santa Barbara, California.