Stuart Whitman Biography

Dark-haired and rugged with sensitive eyes, Stuart Whitman never became a superstar, but, particularly in the late 1950s and through the 60s, was an action hero of motion pictures and TV, thriving in "The Mark" (1961), for which he earned an Academy Award nomination as Best Actor, and in "Cimarron Strip" (CBS, 1967-1971), one of the last of the successful TV Westerns. Although reportedly worth more than $100 million thanks to investments, Whitman has continued to act, perhaps out of a genuine love of his craft, although the quality of his projects has varied.

In a career that has spanned nearly 50 years, Whitman, who had been an amateur boxer, has appeared in more than 75 feature films, making his debut in a bit role in "When Worlds Collide" (1951). Stuart Whitman continued in relatively small roles like a football player in "The All-American" and a sergeant in "The Veils of Baghdad" (both 1953) and a bandit in "Passion" (1954). Whitman finally began to get some real notice as one of "Darby's Rangers" (1958), and subsequently played the circus roustabout cad who woos Joanne Woodward in "The Sound and the Fury" (1959) and Boaz, second husband to the biblical Ruth and ancestor of King David in "The Story of Ruth" (1960). Stuart Whitman had good opportunities in "The Comancheros" and "Francis of Assisi" (both 1961) before his breakthrough role as Jim Fuller in "The Mark". Cast against type as a sexually-confused man with a domineering mother and an ineffectual father who is attracted to young girls, he delivered an excellent, nuanced performance. (This study of "deviance" was also a breakthrough for Hollywood and showed the decline of the Breen Office and Motion Picture Code, which would be replaced by the ratings system in five years.)

Despite his Oscar nomination, Whitman remained typecast in roles that played off his machismo, like the army lieutenant in the all-star "The Longest Day" (1962). Exceptions included "Shock Treatment" (1964), in which he was an out-of-work actor who goes undercover at a mental institution, and "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines" (1965), as the hero of a ribald intrigue. "Sands of the Kalahari" (1965) had Whitman leading air crash survivors through monkey-mad terrain, but was well received. but not so "An American Dream" (1966), based on the Norman Mailer novel about a murderous TV commentator. Turning to the small screen, Whitman co-produced and starred in "Cimarron Strip" (CBS, 1967-71). When he attempted to return to features after the series, he found a changed Hollywood and found himself taking leads and second leads in low-budget independent fare. Stuart Whitman was the bigamist sheriff picked up by the ladies of "Crazy Mama" (1975), a New World production which has since become rediscovered because it was one of Jonathan Demme's early directorial efforts. "Eaten Alive" (1976), however, was a silly yarn about a psychopath with a crocodile on his front lawn directed by Tobe Hooper. Stuart Whitman got a chance to play a real-life hero, oil well fire fighter Red Adair in "Oil" (1976) but by 1980 was reduced to playing Rev. Jim Johnson in "Guyana: Cult of the Damned", an exploitative and lackluster fictional dramatization of the Jonestown massacre. Whitman's films in the 80s and 90s had titles such as "Demonoid" (1981), and "Vultures in Paradise" (1984). By the 90s, he was playing decidedly supporting roles such as in "Trial By Jury" (1994).