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Born Reginald Alfred Truscott-Jones in 1905, after three years of service as a guardsman with the Royal Household Cavalry in London, he entered British films in 1929. There are a few different stories about why he changed his name. Some say that he adopted a variation of his step-father's surname of Mullane. In Ray Milland's autobiography, "Wide-eyed In Babylon" (1974), he explains that after many hours of arguing with his agent, he got up and said, "I don't really care what you call me. I must keep the initial "R" because my mother had it engraved on my suitcases. Other than that, I don't really care, but if you all don't come up with something soon, I'm packing these suitcases and going back to the mill lands where I came from!", thus Ray Milland was born. After several roles, both big and small, he set out for Hollywood in 1930. For several years he played mostly second leads, usually as the heroes friend or rival, but graduated to leads in the mid 1930s. Charming, and debonair, he played suave, self-assured romantic leading men in many drawing room comedies and an occasional mystery or adventure. Always an accomplished performer, he drew little attention to his acting until his strong dramatic performance as an alcoholic writer in The Lost Weekend (1945), for which he won the 1945 Academy Award. Most of his subsequent roles were less rewarding, but he often proved capable of overcoming minor vehicles with interesting characterizations. Starting in 1955, he directed himself in a number of films with surprising proficiency but less-than-remarkable results. After an absence of several years, he returned to the screen in 1970, playing a character part in Love Story (1970), then resumed playing leads in low-budget horror films. He also starred in the TV comedy series "Meet Mr. McNulty" (1953) (1953-55) and in the drama series "Markham" (1959) (1959-60). A book-loving homebody, he kept away from the Hollywood glitter and was rarely mentioned in the gossip columns. He was married to the same woman Malvina for 54 years. |
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