Gary Merrill


Gary Fred Merrill was an American film and television actor whose credits included more than 50 feature films, a half-dozen mostly short-lived TV series, and dozens of television guest appearances. He starred in All About Eve and married his costar Bette Davis.

Early life

Merrill was born in Hartford, Connecticut, and attended Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, and Trinity College in Hartford. He began acting in 1944, while still in the United States Army Air Forces, in the play Winged Victory.

Career

Before entering films, Merrill's deep cultured voice won him a recurring role as Bruce Wayne / Batman in the Superman radio series. His film career began promisingly, with roles in films such as Twelve O'Clock High and All About Eve, but he rarely moved beyond supporting roles in his many Westerns, war movies, and medical dramas. He played a detective and love interest of Barbara Stanwyck's character in Witness to Murder. His television career was extensive. He appeared from 1954 to 1956 as Jason Tyler on the crime drama Justice.
In 1958, Merrill guest starred with June Lockhart in the roles of Joshua and Emily Newton in the episode "Medicine Man" of the series Cimarron City.
Merrill had recurring roles in Then Came Bronson with Michael Parks and Young Doctor Kildare, both of which lasted less than a season.
In addition to Merrill's starring roles in several episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, in November 1963 he starred with Phyllis Thaxter and Fess Parker in an episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour.
In 1964, he starred as city editor Lou Sheldon in the short-lived drama The Reporter.
In 1967, he starred in the Elvis Presley film Clambake, with costar James Gregory.
Aside from an occasional role as narrator, Merrill essentially retired from the entertainment business after 1980. Shortly before his death, he authored the autobiography Bette, Rita and the Rest of My Life.

Personal life and death

Merrill's first marriage, to Barbara Leeds in 1941, ended in divorce in Mexico on July 28, 1950. That same day, he married Bette Davis, his costar from All About Eve, and adopted her daughter, Barbara, from a previous marriage. They adopted two more children, Margot and Michael, but they had a bitter divorce in 1960.
Often politically active, he campaigned in 1958 to elect the Democrat Edmund Muskie as governor of Maine. He also took part in the Selma to Montgomery marches in 1965 to promote Black voter registration. In response to U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson's Vietnam War policy, he unsuccessfully sought nomination to the Maine legislature as an anti-war, pro-environmentalist primary candidate.
Merrill survived his second ex-wife, Bette Davis, by only five months, dying of lung cancer in Falmouth, Maine, on March 5, 1990. He is buried in the Pine Grove Cemetery. He was survived by a son, Michael; a daughter, Margot; a brother, Jerry; and two grandchildren.

Filmography

  • This Is the Army - Backstage Military Policeman on Right
  • Winged Victory - Captain McIntyre
  • Slattery's Hurricane - Commander E.T. Kramer
  • Twelve O'Clock High - Colonel Keith Davenport
  • Mother Didn't Tell Me - Doctor Peter Roberts
  • Where the Sidewalk Ends - Tommy Scalise
  • All About Eve - Bill Sampson.
  • Rawhide - Narrator
  • The Frogmen - Lieutenant Commander Pete Vincent
  • Another Man's Poison - George Bates
  • Decision Before Dawn - Colonel Devlin
  • Phone Call from a Stranger - David Trask
  • The Girl in White - Dr. Seth Pawling
  • Night Without Sleep - Richard Morton
  • A Blueprint for Murder - Fred Sargent
  • Witness to Murder - Lawrence Mathews
  • The Black Dakotas - Brock Marsh, posing as Zachary Paige
  • The Human Jungle - Police Captain John Danforth
  • Navy Wife - Jack Blain
  • Bermuda Affair - Bob Scoffield
  • The Missouri Traveler - Doyle Magee
  • Crash Landing - Captain Steve Williams
  • The Wonderful Country - Major Stark Colton
  • The Savage Eye - The Poet
  • The Great Impostor - Pa Demara
  • The Pleasure of His Company - James Dougherty
  • Mysterious Island - Gideon Spilitt
  • A Girl Named Tamiko - Max Wilson
  • Hong Kong un Addio
  • The Searching Eye - Narrator
  • Catacombs - Raymond Garth
  • Ride Beyond Vengeance - Dub Stokes
  • Cast a Giant Shadow - Pentagon Chief of Staff
  • Destination Inner Space - Dr. LaSatier
  • Around the World Under the Sea - Dr. August 'Gus' Boren
  • The Last Challenge - Squint Calloway
  • Clambake - Sam
  • The Incident - Douglas McCann
  • The Power - Mark Corlane
  • Più tardi, Claire, più tardi - George Dennison
  • Amarsi male as Ingegner Andrea Soriani
  • The Secret of the Sacred Forest - Mike Parks
  • Earth II - Walter Dietrich
  • Huckleberry Finn - Pap
  • Thieves - Street Man
  • The Seekers - Captain Hull

    Television, partial

Merrill's television work spanned from 1953 to 1980. Most of his appearances were in guest-star roles in episodic and anthology series. Among the programs he appeared in were:
  • The 20th Century-Fox Hour
  • * as Alan Byrnes
  • * as David Trask
  • Wagon Train as Zeke Thomas
  • The Jane Wyman Show as Dicksen
  • Studio 57
  • Studio One as Paul Gormay
  • Cimarron City as Joshua Newton
  • Playhouse 90
  • * as Walter Hubbard
  • * as McBurnie
  • * as Louis
  • Alcoa Theatre as Dick Bowen
  • Rawhide as Jed Mason
  • Laramie as Ed Farrell
  • The Twilight Zone
  • Alfred Hitchcock Presents
  • * as Sergeant Rockwell
  • * as Ted Franklin
  • * as Carl Adams
  • * as Joseph Pond
  • * as Cash Bentley
  • Zane Grey Theater
  • * as Colonel Boyd Nelson
  • * as Noah Rawlins
  • * as Luke Cannon
  • * as Ken Kenyon
  • General Electric Theater
  • * as McMasters
  • * as John Dwight
  • Checkmate as Ernie Stone
  • Winston Churchill: The Valiant Years as Narrator
  • Ben Casey as Miles Houghton
  • Combat! as Captain August
  • Sam Benedict as Sergeant Bill Merriman
  • The Alfred Hitchcock Hour
  • * as John Pemberton
  • * as Harry Jarvis
  • The Outer Limits as Dr. James Hamilton / Major Roger Brothers
  • Branded
  • * as Aaron Shields
  • * as Aaron Shields
  • Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre as John Perry
  • Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea as Park
  • The Time Tunnel as Senator Leroy Clark
  • Marcus Welby, M.D. as Orlando 'Cord' Corday
  • Medical Center as Jason Norman
  • Kung Fu as Dan Hoyle
  • Cannon as Andrew McGill
  • Movin' On
  • * as Paul Lorimer
  • * as Samson
  • ''The American Adventure''

    Radio appearances