James Allen Whitmore's Biography

Born in White Plains, New York, to Florence Belle (née Crane) and James Allen Whitmore, Sr., a park commission official, Whitmore attended Amherst Central High School in Snyder, New York, before graduating from The Choate School (now Choate Rosemary Hall) in Wallingford, Connecticut. He went on to study at Yale University, where he was a member of Skull and Bones. He later was commissioned a Second Lieutenant and served in the United States Marine Corps in the Panama Canal Zone during World War II.

Following World War II, Whitmore appeared on Broadway in the role of the Sergeant in Command Decision. MGM hired Whitmore on contract, but his role in the

film adaptation was played by Van Johnson. Whitmore's first major picture was Battleground, in a role that was turned down by Spencer Tracy, and for which Whitmore was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Other major films included The Asphalt Jungle, The Next Voice You Hear,[3][4] Above and Beyond, Kiss Me, Kate, Them!, Oklahoma!, Black Like Me, Guns of the Magnificent Seven, Tora! Tora! Tora!, and Give 'em Hell, Harry!, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of former U.S. President Harry S Truman. In the film Tora! Tora! Tora! he played the part of Admiral William F. "Bull" Halsey.

In the 1960-1961 television season, Whitmore starred in his own crime drama on ABC entitled The Law and Mr. Jones, in the title role, with Conlan Carter as legal assistant C.E. Carruthers and Janet De Gore as his secretary. The program ran at the 10:30 Eastern half-hour slot on Friday. It was cancelled after one year but returned in April 1962 for thirteen additional episodes on Thursday to fill the half-hour vacated by the cancellation of the ABC sitcom Margie.

In 1963, Whitmore played Captain William Benteen in The Twilight Zone episode "On Thursday We Leave for Home". In 1965 he guest-starred as Col. Paul J. Hartley in episode 32, "The Hero"

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of 12 O-Clock High (TV series). In 1967 he guest starred as a security guard in The Invaders episode, Quantity: Unknown. That same year, he appeared on an episode of ABC's Custer starring Wayne Maunder in the title role. In 1969, Whitmore played the leading character of Professor Woodruff in the TV series My Friend Tony, produced by NBC. Whitmore also made several memorable appearances on the classic ABC western The Big Valley starring Barbara Stanwyck and the classic NBC western The Virginian starring James Drury during the second half of the 1960s. From 1972-1973, he played Dr. Vincent Campanelli in the short-lived ABC medical sitcom Temperatures Rising. He also appeared in Planet of the Apes.

Whitmore was in uniform for the first four movies he made for Warner Bros in two years after moving there in 1954. He was also swallowed by a 12ft ant in Them! (1954). He had another rare lead in Don Siegel's Crime in the Streets (1956), very adroit as a sympathetic social worker. He was also excellent in Face of Fire (1959), based on Stephen Crane's story The Monster, as a much-loved handyman who gets hideously disfigured, and as a reporter in Black Like Me (1964) who takes drugs to pass for black in the south to experience racial prejudice. Numerous more conventional roles as army officers or western sidekicks, notably the

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knife thrower in Guns of the Magnificent Seven (1969) and Admiral Halsey in Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970) followed.

In the 70s Whitmore became a magnificent one-man acting machine on stage portraying such inspired notables as Will Rogers, Harry Truman and Theodore Roosevelt. He disappeared into these historical legends so efficiently that even the powers-that-be had the good sense to preserve them on film and TV in the form of Will Rogers' USA (1972) (TV); Give 'em Hell, Harry! (1975), which earned him his second Oscar nomination; and Bully: An Adventure with Teddy Roosevelt (1978)

One of his greatest triumphs was in the theatre as Truman in Give 'em Hell, Harry! (1975). Whitmore was Oscar-nominated when it was filmed, uncannily capturing the essence of the president with humour and emotion. He was also remarkable in Will Rogers' USA (1974) and as Roosevelt in Bully (1977). Other stage roles included Sheridan Whiteside in The Man Who Came to Dinner, Norman Thayer in On Golden Pond and Joe Keller in Arthur Miller's All My Sons (which he recreated on television in 1986).

In 1994, in The Shawshank Redemption, he became known to a new generation as the prison librarian, unable to function on the outside. In 2000, the ever-energetic Whitmore won an Emmy as outstanding guest actor in the TV law series

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The Practice, and was nominated for Mr Sterling (2003) as the father of a US senator.

Whitmore was twice married to Nancy Mygatt. They first married in 1947 and the couple had three sons before their divorce in 1971. One of those sons, James III, has gone on to find success as a television actor and director, under the name James Whitmore, Jr. Another son, Steve Whitmore, went on to be public spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. His youngest son, Daniel, was a Forest Service Snow Ranger and firefighter before starting his own construction company.

Following the divorce from Mygatt, Whitmore was married to actress Audra Lindley (died 1997) from 1972 until 1979. He later remarried Mygatt, but they divorced again after two years.

In 2001, he married actress and author Noreen Nash, who is the grandmother of film actor Sebastian Siegel.

Whitmore is the grandfather of Survivor: Gabon contestant Matty Whitmore. In his later years, Whitmore spent most of his summers in Peterborough, New Hampshire, performing with the Peterborough Players.

Although not always politically active, in 2007, Whitmore generated some publicity with his endorsement of Barack Obama for U.S. President. In January 2008, Whitmore appeared in

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television commercials for the First Freedom First campaign, which advocates preserving "the separation of church and state" and protecting religious liberty.

Whitmore was diagnosed with lung cancer in November 2008, from which he died at his Malibu, California, home on February 6, 2009. He was 87. His ashes were scattered into the Pacific Ocean.

Source :

wikipedia.org :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Whitmore

latimes.com :http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-james-whitmore7-2009feb07,0,1015401.story

guardian.co.uk :http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2009/feb/10/james-whitmore-obituary

imdb.com :http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0926235/bio

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