Tom Tryon
| Tom Tryon | |
|---|---|
 Tryon in The Unholy Wife (1957) | |
| Born | Thomas Tryon (1926-01-14)January 14, 1926 Hartford, Connecticut, U.S. |
| Died | September 4, 1991(1991-09-04) (aged 65) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actor, writer |
| Years active | 1955–1991 |
| Spouse(s) | Ann Noyes (1955–1958, divorced)[1] |
| Partner(s) |
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Thomas "Tom" Tryon (January 14, 1926 – September 4, 1991) was an American film and television actor as well as a novelist. He is best known for playing the title role in the film The Cardinal (1963), featured roles in the war films The Longest Day (1962) and In Harm's Way (1965) with John Wayne, and especially the Walt Disney television character Texas John Slaughter (1958–1961). He later turned to the writing of prose fiction and screenplays, and wrote several science fiction, horror and mystery novels.
Contents
1 Early life and education
2 Acting career
2.1 Broadway
2.2 Early Film Appearances
2.3 Paramount
2.4 Texas John Slaughter
2.5 20th Century Fox
2.6 Otto Preminger
2.7 Later Acting Appearances
3 Writing career
4 Personal life
5 Death
6 Selected works as writer
6.1 Novels
6.2 Collections
6.3 Short stories and novellas
7 Filmography and television work
8 References
9 External links
Early life and education
Thomas Tryon was born on January 14, 1926, in Hartford, Connecticut, as the son of Arthur Lane Tryon, a clothier[1][4] and owner of Stackpole, Moore & Tryon. (He is often erroneously identified as the son of silent screen actor Glenn Tryon.)
He served in the United States Navy in the Pacific from 1943–1946[4] during and after World War II. Upon return from the U.S. Navy he attended and graduated from Yale.
Acting career
Tryon studied acting at NYC's Neighborhood Playhouse under the tutelage of Sanford Meisner.
Broadway
He appeared in the 1952 original Broadway production of Wish You Were Here, a long-running musical that starred Jack Cassidy, Patricia Marand and Sheila Bond.
Early Film Appearances
Tryon appeared in The Way of the World (1955).
He guest starred in 1955 as Antoine De More in the two-part episode "King of the Dakotas" of NBC's western anthology series Frontier.
Paramount
Tryon was signed to a long term contract to Paramount. His film debut was in The Scarlet Hour (1956) at Paramount, directed by Michael Curtiz. It was a crime drama about a man whose married lover persuades him to commit a robbery; Tryon was second billed.
He was top billed in a low budget war film at Allied Artists, Screaming Eagles (1956), then supported Charlton Heston and Anne Baxter in Three Violent People (1956) at Paramount.
He was announced for Short Cut to Hell but did not make it.[5]
Tryon's work was mostly in TV though, appearing in Jane Wyman Presents The Fireside Theatre, The 20th Century-Fox Hour, Playhouse 90 (an adaptation of Charley's Aunt), Zane Grey Theater, Studio 57, Matinee Theatre, and Lux Video Theatre.
He had a support role in RKO's The Unholy Wife (1957) billed after Rod Steiger and Diana Dors. He had the lead in a low budget science fiction film at Paramount, I Married a Monster from Outer Space (1958).
Tryon appeared in the lead in "The Mark Hanford Story" (February 26, 1958) on NBC's Wagon Train. He portrayed an educated half-breed outraged at his father, Jack Hanford (played by Onslow Stevens), for having mistreated Mark's Cheyenne mother. Kathleen Crowley portrayed Ann Jamison, a young woman that the senior Hanford plans to marry after the self-banishment and then suicide of Mark's mother.[6]
Tryon's other television roles included The Restless Gun, General Electric Theater, The Millionaire, The Big Valley, and The Joseph Cotten Show: On Trial.
Texas John Slaughter
Tryon played Texas John Slaughter for Disney in a series of TV movies for Disney which ran from 1958 to 1961. The role was based on actual historical figure John Slaughter.[7]
He was considered but eventually passed over for the role of Janet Leigh's lover, Sam Loomis, in the classic thriller, Psycho (1960).
20th Century Fox
Tryon is on the right behind John Wayne, from the movie The Longest Day
Tryon starred in The Story of Ruth (1960) at 20th Century Fox. For that studio he appeared in Marines, Let's Go (1961).
Disney borrowed him to star in a satire about the space age, Moon Pilot (1962). He was one of many names in The Longest Day (1962) at Fox.
In 1962, Tryon was cast to play the role of Stephen Burkett ("Adam") in the unfinished Marilyn Monroe-Dean Martin comedy film, Something's Got to Give, directed by George Cukor, but lost that role after Monroe was fired from the movie.
He guest starred on Dr. Kildare and The Virginian.
Otto Preminger
Tryon's greatest role was as an ambitious Catholic priest in The Cardinal (1963). The film was a box office hit and Tryon received a nomination for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama. However, that honor barely compensated for the trauma and abuse he suffered at the hands of director Otto Preminger. At one point during filming, Preminger fired Tryon in front of his parents when they visited the set, then rehired him after being satisfied that Tryon had been sufficiently humiliated.[8]
"Finally, I was in a position of being able to pick my roles," said Tryon in 1986. "But I didn't like the movie. I didn't like me in the movie. To this day, I cannot look at that film. It's because of Preminger. He was a tyrant who ruled by terror. He tied me up in knots. He screamed at me. He called me names. He said I was lazy. He said I was a fool. He never cursed me. His insults were far more personal."[9]
Tryon guest starred on Kraft Suspense Theatre then was reunited with Preminger in In Harm's Way (1965).
He had the lead in The Glory Guys (1965).
Later Acting Appearances
He was part of a live television performance of The Fall of the House of Usher. He also co-wrote a song, "I Wish I Was," which appeared on an obscure record by Dick Kallman, star of the short-lived and now largely forgotten 1965 television sitcom, Hank.
He guest starred on The Big Valley and Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre and appeared in the 1967 episode "Charade of Justice" of NBC's western series The Road West starring Barry Sullivan.
Tryon starred in a TV movie remake of Winchester 73 (1967).
Tryon went to Europe to star in Persecución hasta Valencia (1968) and Australia to make Color Me Dead (1969).
Writing career
Disillusioned with acting, Tryon retired from the profession in 1969 and began writing horror and mystery novels. He was successful, overcoming skepticism about a classically handsome movie star suddenly turning novelist.
He also moved into film financing, being executive producer on Johnny Got His Gun (1971).
His best-known work is The Other (1971), about a boy whose evil twin brother may or may not be responsible for a series of deaths in a small rural community in the 1930s. He adapted his novel into a film released the following year, which starred Diana Muldaur, Uta Hagen, and John Ritter.
Harvest Home (1973), about the dark pagan rituals being practiced in a small New England town, was adapted as The Dark Secret of Harvest Home (1978), a television mini-series starring Bette Davis. An extensive critical analysis of Tryon's horror novels can be found in S. T. Joshi's book The Modern Weird Tale (2001).
His other books include Crowned Heads, a collection of novellas inspired by the legends of Hollywood. Tryon sold the film rights to Universal to make four films based on the novellas.[10]
The first of these novellas, Fedora, about a reclusive former film actress whose relationship with her plastic surgeon is similar to that between a drug addict and her pusher, was later converted to a feature film directed by Billy Wilder. Though the film was only moderately successful, it is considered by many[who?] to be a minor classic of the thriller and horror genres.
Other novellas in the collection were based on the murder of former silent screen star Ramón Novarro, and the quasi-Oedipal relationship between actor Clifton Webb and his mother. Lady (1974) concerns the friendship between an eight-year-old boy and a charming widow in 1930s New England and the secret he discovers about her. Many[who?] consider this to be Tryon's best work. His novel The Night of the Moonbow (1989) tells the story of a boy driven to violent means by the constant harassment he receives at a summer boys camp. Night Magic, written in 1991, was posthumously published in 1995.
Personal life
Tryon married, in 1955, Ann L. Noyes, the daughter of stockbroker Joseph Leo Lilienthal and his wife, the former Edna Arnstein. She was the former wife of Thomas Ewing Noyes, with whom she had been a theatrical producer.[11][12][13] The Tryons divorced in 1958,[1] and Ann Tryon resumed her previous married name, dying as Ann L. Noyes in 1966.[1][14]
During the 1970s, he was in a romantic relationship with Clive Clerk, one of the original cast members of A Chorus Line and an interior designer who decorated Tryon's apartment on Central Park West in New York City, which was featured in Architectural Digest.[2]
Tryon was also involved in a relationship with Calvin Culver, also known as Casey Donovan, a gay porn star.[3]
Death
Tryon died of stomach cancer on September 4, 1991, at the age of 65, in Los Angeles, California.
[15]
Selected works as writer
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Filmography and television work
The Scarlet Hour (1956) as E.V. 'Marsh' Marshall
Screaming Eagles (1956) as Pvt. Mason
Three Violent People (1956) as Beauregard 'Cinch' Saunders
The Unholy Wife (1957) as San Sanders
I Married a Monster from Outer Space (1958) as Bill Farrell
Gundown at Sandoval (1959) as Texas John Slaughter
The Story of Ruth (1960) as Mahlon
Marines, Let's Go (1961) as Pfc. Skip Roth
Moon Pilot (1962) as Capt. Richmond Talbot
The Longest Day (1962) as Lieutenant Wilson
Something's Got to Give (1962) as Stephen Burkett
The Cardinal (1963) as Stephen Fermoyle
In Harm's Way (1965) as Lieutenant William 'Mac' McConnel
The Glory Guys (1965) as Capt. Demas Harrod
The Midas Man (1966) as Scott Breckenridge
Persecución hasta Valencia (a.k.a. The Narco Men, 1970) as Harry Bell
Color Me Dead (1969) as Frank Bigelow
Johnny Got His Gun (1971) (uncredited)
The Horsemen (1971) (uncredited) (final film role)
References
^ abcd "Tom Tryon". Turner Classic Movies. n.d. Retrieved December 21, 2010.
^ ab Tom Tryon on IMDb
^ ab Edmonson, Roger (1998). Boy in the Sand — Casey Donovan, All-American Sex Star. Los Angeles, California: Alyson Books. p. 144. ISBN 978-1-555-83457-9.
^ ab "Tom Tryon-Biography". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 21 December 2010.
^ Tom Tryon Wins Break With Cagney; Theater Men Plan Six Pictures
Schallert, Edwin. Los Angeles Times 28 Jan 1957: A7.
^ Wagon Train episode "The Mark Hanford Story" on IMDb
^ Has Gun-and How He Travels!: Tom Tryon Just Missed Some Film Plums. Now He's Happy as a Hard-Ridin TV Sheriff
Hopper, Hedda. Chicago Daily Tribune 2 Nov 1958: f28.
^ Fujiwara, Chris (2008). The World and Its Double — The Life and Work of Otto Preminger. New York City, New York: Faber and Faber. p. 302. ISBN 978-0-571-21117-3.
^ THE FLAMBOYANT TOM TRYON Christy, Marian. Boston Globe 2 Nov 1986: C25.
^ MOVIE CALL SHEET: Four-Film Deal for Tryon Novel
Murphy, Mary. Los Angeles Times 5 Mar 1976: e12.
^ Thomas Ewing Noyes, 1922-1997, was a son of American journalist Newbold Noyes and a grandson of Frank Brett Noyes, a president of Associated Press. He later became a commentator on National Public Radio.
^ Everett Aaker, Television Western Players of the Fifties (McFarland, 1997), page 506
^ "Miss Lilienthal, Pensacola Bride", The New York Times, 20 December 1944
^ "Noyes, Ann L.", The New York Times, 24 November 1966
^ "Author, actor Thomas Tryon dies of stomach cancer". Boca Raton News. Boca Raton, Florida. Associated Press. September 5, 1991. p. 4A. Retrieved April 21, 2016.
External links
 | Wikimedia Commons has media related to Tom Tryon. |
Tom Tryon at AllMovie
Tom Tryon on IMDb
Tom Tryon at the TCM Movie Database
Tom Tryon at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
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