Leo Gordon

Leo Vincent Gordon (December 2, 1922 - December 26, 2000) was an American movie and television character actor as well as a screenplay writer. He specialized in playing brutish bad guys during more than forty years in film and television.

Early life and career

Gordon was born in Brooklyn, New York City on December 2, 1922. His early life was difficult. He was raised by his father in dire poverty and grew up during the Great Depression. At the outset of World War II he joined the army but soon found he was not suited to life under military discipline. He left the army in 1943 after two years of service. Following his honorable discharge, finding himself homeless and without profession or family, he eventually drifted to Southern California and into a life of crime. Following a conviction for armed robbery, he was sentenced to four years at the infamous San Quentin State Prison near San Francisco where he earned a reputation among both the guards and his fellow prisoners as a troublemaker and someone not to fool with.

Following his release, Gordon returned home to New York and found work in construction. Realizing this was not the career for him, he took advantage of the military benefits accorded him as part of the G.I. Bill and began taking acting lessons at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. During his time at the academy, Gordon was enrolled with several future screen legends including Grace Kelly and Anne Bancroft. For a time, Jason Robards, later a two-time Academy Award winner, was Gordon's instructor. It was here that he also met his future wife, Lynn Cartwright, who would have a sporadic but lengthy career as a character actor, mainly in television. They were married in 1950 and by most accounts enjoyed a long and happy marriage until his death a half century later. He and Lynn had one child, a daughter they named Tara.

Career in film and television

Gordon started his career on the stage and worked with such luminaries as Edward G. Robinson and Tyrone Power. He was soon discovered by a Hollywood agent in a Los Angeles production of "Darkness at Noon." Over the course of his career, he would appear in more than 170 film and television productions from the early 1950s to the mid 1990s.

Gordon was often cast to make the most of his large size, intense features, menacing voice, and icy stare. One of his earliest films was Riot in Cell Block 11, which was filmed at San Quentin where Gordon had served time. He was well known to the guards there, who were wary of him since they remembered him vividly as one of their toughest inmates. Throughout the course of the entire shooting schedule at the prison, Gordon was not permitted to enter or leave with the other cast members; he was only allowed to enter and exit by himself and was thoroughly searched each time. The film's director, Don Siegel, was widely quoted as saying Gordon was the "scariest man I ever met."

Other notable roles included playing a highly charged Dillinger in Siegel's Baby Face Nelson, opposite Mickey Rooney as the crazed protagonist. Gordon may be most noted for his recurring character "Big Mike McComb" on the Maverick television series from 1957 to 1960, working alongside James Garner and Jack Kelly, including an appearance in the famous "Shady Deal at Sunny Acres" episode. Garner later recalled in his videotaped interview for the Archive of American Television that Gordon purposely punched him for real in one of their first scenes together and that Garner hit him back when filming the next scene.

One of his best remembered television appearances was a spoof of High Noon, with Gordon playing an ex-convict who seemingly wants revenge against Andy Taylor in the episode "High Noon in Mayberry" on The Andy Griffith Show. Perhaps Gordon's single most memorable film scene occurred in McLintock! (1963), during which John Wayne knocks him down a long mudslide after uttering the famous line "Somebody oughta belt you but I won't! I won't! The hell I won't."

Capable of playing more than villain roles, Gordon effectively portrayed sympathetic parts when called upon to do so. Most memorable among these were his performances in the western Black Patch (1957), a film which he wrote, and in Roger Corman's civil rights drama The Intruder (1962), opposite a young William Shatner. He also appeared as aging wrestler Milo Stavroupolis in Little House on the Prairie. In each of these roles, particularly the latter, he turned in first-rate performances. In all, Gordon made more than 180 television and film appearances throughout his long career.

Career as a screenwriter

Gordon also wrote scripts for television episodes and movies, sometimes writing himself a good role. Frequently billed as "Leo V. Gordon," he wrote dozens of scripts that would later became movies or television episodes. His first successful film script "The Cry Baby Killer" featured a young and unknown Jack Nicholson. Among the most notable feature films he penned were You Can't Win 'Em All (1970) starring Tony Curtis and Charles Bronson and Tobruk (1967) starring Rock Hudson and George Peppard and directed by Arthur Hiller, in which he appeared as sergeant Krug. In addition to film and television scripts, Gordon also penned several novels, including the historical Western "Powerkeg."

During the 1950s and 1960s Gordon was one of those character actors who seemed to make an appearance on virtually every Western television show from Bonanza to Cheyenne to Rin Tin Tin. As a screen writer, he wrote nearly fifty scripts apiece for Bonanza and Cheyenne. In the 1970s he would frequently appear on the popular police drama Adam-12, another show he often scripted. Gordon's final role was as Wyatt Earp in a 1994 episode of the television series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. He also appeared in Maverick that same year with Mel Gibson, Jodie Foster and James Garner.

Later life and persona

In contrast to his screen persona, Gordon was well-known as a quiet, thoughtful and intelligent man who generally avoided the Hollywood spotlight. He was widely regarded by his fellow actors and his directors as a well-prepared professional. In 1997, he received the "Golden Boot Award" for his many years of work in Westerns. In accepting the award, the actor simply flashed a smile for his fans and remarked "Thank God for type casting!"

After struggling with a brief illness, Gordon died in his sleep at age 78 at his Los Angeles home from cardiac failure. He and his wife's ashes are interred at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Los Angeles.

External links

• Leo Gordon at the Internet Movie Database