Fredric March

Fredric March (Ernest Frederick McIntyre Bickel) (August 31, 1897–April 14, 1975) was an Academy Award winning American actor.

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Ernest Frederick McIntyre Bickel was born in Racine, Wisconsin. He began as a banker, but an emergency appendectomy caused him to reevaluate his life, and in 1920 he began to be cast as an extra in movies made in New York City, using a shortened form of his mother's maiden name, Marcher. He appeared on Broadway in 1926, and won an Oscar nomination in 1930 for The Royal Family of Broadway, in which he played a role based upon John Barrymore. March won the Oscar in 1932 for Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and again in 1946 for The Best Years of Our Lives.

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March was one of the few actors to resist the studios, and was able to pick and choose his roles, in the process also avoiding typecasting. By this time, he was working on Broadway as often as in Hollywood, and his screen career was not as prolific as it had been. Perhaps his greatest late-in-life role was in Inherit the Wind in 1960, opposite Spencer Tracy.

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Throughout his life, he was a proponent of liberal political causes. He was a steady supporter of the Democratic Party. When March underwent surgery for prostate cancer in 1972, it seemed his career was over, yet he managed to give one last great performance in The Iceman Cometh. Ironically, co-star Robert Ryan was entering the final stages of lung cancer, so the film was shot on a deathwatch.

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Fredric March died in Los Angeles, California, at the age of 77 from cancer. He had been married to the actress Florence Eldridge from 1927 until his death.

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August 31: August 31 is the 243rd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (244th in leap years), with 122 days remaining, as the final day of August....

1897: 1897 was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar)....

1975: 1975 was a common year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1975 calendar)....

Fredric March related Images and Photos (experimental)

Fredric March Print	The Buccaneer Fredric March 1938	Fredric March Gary Cooper and Miriam Hopkins: Design For Living 1933	Jealousy Jeanne Eagels Fredric March on Window Card 1929
Act of Murder Fredric March 1948	All of Me Fredric March Miriam Hopkins George Raft Helen Mack on Midget Window Card 1934	Tonight Is Ours Fredric March Claudette Colbert on Midget Window Card 1933	The Buccaneer Franciska Gaal Fredric March on Midget Window Card 1938
I Married a Witch Fredric March Veronica Lake Robert Benchley 1942	Les Miserables Charles Laughton Fredric March on Window Card 1935	Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Fredric March 1931	The Wild Party Clara Bow Fredric March 1929