Robert Preston

Robert Preston Meservey (June 8, 1918 – March 21, 1987) was an American stage and screen actor, best known for his role as Professor Harold Hill in the 1957 musical The Music Man, for which he received the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical. He reprised the role in the 1962 film adaptation, and received a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy nomination.

Preston made his Broadway debut in The Male Animal in 1952. He won two Tony Awards for Best Actor in a Musical for The Music Man (1957) and I Do! I Do! (1967) and was Tony-nominated for Mack and Mabel (1975). He co-starred alongside Steve McQueen in the Sam Peckinpah film Junior Bonner (1972). Preston collaborated twice with director Blake Edwards, first in S.O.B. (1981) and again in Victor/Victoria (1982), the latter earning him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Early life Preston was born Robert Preston Meservey in Newton, Massachusetts, the son of Ruth L. (née Rea) and Frank Wesley Meservey, a garment worker and a billing clerk for American Express. His family moved to Los Angeles in his youth; he graduated from Abraham Lincoln High School in January 1935.

Career 1938–1942: Career beginnings

Preston appeared in a stock company production of Julius Caesar and a Pasadena Playhouse production of Idiot's Delight. A Paramount Pictures attorney liked his work and recruited him to the studio. The Los Angeles Times reported that Preston's mother was employed by Decca Records, Bing Crosby's label, and was acquainted with Crosby's brother Everett, a talent agent; she convinced him to watch one of Preston's performances at the Pasadena Playhouse. The result was a contract with the Crosby agency and a movie deal with Paramount Pictures, Crosby's studio. Preston made his screen debut in 1938, in the crime dramas King of Alcatraz (1938) and Illegal Traffic.

The studio ordered Preston to stop using his family name of Meservey. As Robert Preston, the name by which he was known for his entire professional career, he appeared in many Hollywood films, predominantly but not exclusively Westerns. He was Digby Geste in the sound remake of Beau Geste (1939) with Gary Cooper and Ray Milland, and Dick Allen in the Cecil B DeMille epic Union Pacific. During the 1950s, Preston found additional roles in television.

1957–1979: The Music Man and acclaim

Preston is probably best known for his performance as Professor Harold Hill in Meredith Willson's musical The Music Man (1957). "They'd run through all the musical comedy people before they cast me", he remembered years later.

In 1961, Preston was asked to make a recording as part of a program by the President's Council on Physical Fitness to encourage schoolchildren to do more daily exercise. The song, Chicken Fat, composed by Meredith Willson and performed by Preston with full orchestral accompaniment, was recorded during sessions for The Music Man soundtrack. The recording was distributed by Capitol Records to elementary schools across the nation and played for students as they performed calisthenics.

In 1962, Preston starred opposite Shirley Jones in the film version of The Music Man, although, surprisingly, he was not the studio’s first choice despite his success on Broadway. In 1979, Preston portrayed a snake-handling family patriarch Hadley Chisholm in a CBS Western miniseries, The Chisholms, with Rosemary Harris as his wife, Minerva. The story chronicled the Chisholm family losing their land in Virginia and migrating to the west to begin a new life. When CBS continued the saga as a weekly series the following year, Preston reprised his role, but his character died in the fifth episode. The series, which also featured co-stars Ben Murphy, Brett Cullen, and James Van Patten, lasted only four more episodes after Preston's departure.

Later career Preston's other film roles during the 1970s included Ace Bonner in Sam Peckinpah's Junior Bonner (1972), Joseph Dobbs in the mystery Child's Play, directed by Sidney Lumet, and "Big Ed" Bookman in Semi-Tough (1977). He appeared in Blake Edwards' Hollywood satire, S.O.B. (1981) and Edwards' Victor/Victoria (1982), for which he was nominated for an Academy Award as best supporting actor. On television, Preston starred in the well-received CBS whodunit Rehearsal for Murder (1982), as a playwright attempting to solve the murder of his fiancée. He portrayed an aging gunfighter in September Gun (1983), a CBS TV Western film opposite Patty Duke and Christopher Lloyd. In 1985, he starred in another well-received TV movie Finnegan, Begin Again with Mary Tyler Moore, for HBO. Preston was diagnosed with lung cancer in 1986; he died of the disease on March 21, 1987 in Montecito, California.

Acting credits Film Year Title Role Notes 1938 King of Alcatraz Robert MacArthur Illegal Traffic Charles Bent Martin 1939 Disbarred Bradley Kent Union Pacific Dick Allen Beau Geste Digby Geste 1940 Typhoon Johnny Potter North West Mounted Police Ronnie Logan Moon Over Burma Chuck Lane 1941 The Lady from Cheyenne Steve Lewis Parachute Battalion Donald Morse New York Town Paul Bryson, Jr. The Night of January 16th Steve Van Ruyle Pacific Blackout Robert Draper 1942 Star Spangled Rhythm Himself uncredited Reap the Wild Wind Dan Cutler This Gun for Hire Michael Crane Wake Island Pvt. Joe Doyle 1943 Night Plane from Chungking Capt. Nick Stanton Wings Up 1947 The Macomber Affair Francis Macomber Variety Girl Himself Wild Harvest Jim Davis 1948 Big City Rev. Philip Y. Andrews Blood on the Moon Tate Riling Whispering Smith Murray Sinclair 1949 Tulsa Brad Brady The Lady Gambles David Boothe 1950 The Sundowners James Cloud ('Kid Wichita') 1951 When I Grow Up Father Reed Cloudburst John Graham Best of the Badmen Matthew Fowler My Outlaw Brother Joe Waldner Face to Face Sheriff Jack Potter 1955 The Last Frontier Col. Frank Marston 1956 Sentinels in the Air Narrator Voice; 1960 The Dark at the Top of the Stairs Rubin Flood 1962 The Music Man Harold Hill How the West Was Won Roger Morgan 1963 Island of Love Steve Blair All the Way Home Jay Follett 1972 Junior Bonner Ace Bonner Child's Play Joseph Dobbs 1974 Mame Beauregard Jackson Pickett Burnside 1977 Semi-Tough Big Ed Bookman 1981 S.O.B. Dr. Irving Finegarten 1982 Victor/Victoria Carroll "Toddy" Todd 1984 The Last Starfighter Centauri

Television Year Title Role Venue 1979–1980 The Chisholms Hadley Chisholm 9 episodes1982 Rehearsal for Murder Alex Dennison Television movie 1983 September Gun Ben Sunday Television movie 1985 Finnegan Begin Again Mike Finnegan Television movie 1986 Outrage! Dennis Riordan Television movie

Theatre Year Title Role Venue Ref. 1951 Twentieth Century Oscar Jaffe Fulton Theater, Broadway 1952–1953 The Male Animal Joe Ferguson City Center, Broadway 1953 Men of Distinction Peter Hogarth 48th Street Theatre, Broadway 1954 His and Hers Clem Scot The Magic and the Loss George Wilson Booth Theatre, Broadway 1955 The Tender Trap Joe McCall Longacre Theatre, Broadway Janus Gil Plymouth Theatre, Broadway 1957 The Hidden River Jean Monnerie Playhouse Theatre, Broadway 1957–1961 The Music Man Prof. Harold Hill Majestic Theatre, Broadway 1963 Too True to be Good The Burglar 54th Street Theatre, Broadway 1963–1964 Nobody Loves an Albatross Nat Bentley Lyceum Theatre, Broadway 1964–1965 Ben Franklin in Paris Benjamin Franklin Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, Broadway 1966 The Lion in Winter Henry II Ambassador Theatre, Broadway 1966–1968 I Do! I Do! He / Michael 46th Street Theatre, Broadway 1974 Mack & Mabel Mack Sennett Majestic Theatre, Broadway 1976–1978 Sly Fox Foxwell Sly / The Judge Broadhurst Theatre, Broadway 1978 The Prince of Grand Street Philadelphia / Boston

Radio Year Program Episode/source 1950 Lux Radio Theatre Alexander's Ragtime Band

Awards and nominations Year Association Category Project Result Ref. Film and Television Awards 1962 Golden Globe Awards Best Actor – Musical or Comedy The Music Man 1981 National Society of Film Critics Awards Best Supporting Actor S.O.B. 1982 National Board of Review Awards Best Supporting ActorVictor/Victoria 1982 Academy Awards Best Supporting Actor 1982 New York Film Critics Circle Awards Best Supporting Actor 1982 Golden Globe AwardsBest Actor – Musical or Comedy 1984 Saturn Awards Best Supporting Actor The Last Starfighter Theatre Awards 1958Tony AwardsBest Actor in a Musical The Music Man 1967 I Do! I Do! 1975 Mack & Mabel