Paul Douglas
 Paul
Douglas (April 11, 1907 – September 11, 1959) was an American actor.
Born Paul Douglas Fleischer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he was
originally an announcer for CBS radio station WCAU in that city,
relocating to network headquarters in New York in 1934. Douglas
co-hosted CBS's popular swing music program, The Saturday Night
Swing Club, from 1936 to 1939.
He made his Broadway debut in
1936 as the Radio Announcer in Doty Hobart and Tom McKnight's Double
Dummy at the John Golden Theatre. In 1946 he won both a Theatre
World Award and a Clarence Derwent Award for his portrayal of Harry
Brock in Garson Kanin's Born Yesterday.
Douglas began
appearing in films in 1949. He may be best remembered for two
baseball comedy movies, Angels in the Outfield (1951) and It Happens
Every Spring (1949). He also played Richard Widmark's police partner
in the 1950 thriller Panic in the Streets, frustrated newlywed
Porter Hollingsway in A Letter to Three Wives (1949), Sgt. Kowalski
in The Big Lift (1950), businessman Josiah Walter Dudley in
Executive Suite (1954) and a con man turned monk in When in Rome
(1952). Douglas was host of the 22nd annual Academy Awards in March
1950. Continuing in radio, he was the announcer for The Ed Wynn
Show, and the first host of NBC Radio's The Horn & Hardart
Children's Hour. In April 1959 Douglas appeared in The Lucille Ball-Desi
Arnaz Show as Lucy Ricardo's television morning show co-host in the
episode "Lucy Wants a Career".
Douglas was originally cast in
the 1960 episode of The Twilight Zone called "The Mighty Casey", a
role written for him by Rod Serling based on his character in Angels
in the Outfield, but Douglas died the day after production of the
episode had been completed. His role was taken over by Jack Warden,
and most of the episode was refilmed several months later.
In
January 1942, Douglas married actress Virginia Field; Field was 7
months pregnant. After moving in February 1942, Johnnie Douglas was
born on March 2, 1942. Paul found out that Field was having an
affair with Dick Powell, and they separated in December 1945. They
divorced on January 30, 1946, and Douglas returned to California to
resume his acting career. After 3 1/2 years of being single, he met
Jan Sterling at MGM Studios and soon they were engaged. They married
on June 22, 1950, in Palm Springs, California and soon moved to
Burlington, Vermont, where their daughter, Celia Douglas, was born
on August 30, 1954.
Paul Douglas died of a heart attack in
Hollywood, California on September 11, 1959, at the age of 52. Film
director Billy Wilder and his longtime co-writer I. A. L. ('Izzy')
Diamond had just offered him the role of Jeff Sheldrake in the 1960
movie The Apartment that went to Fred MacMurray instead. Wilder
later said: "I saw him and his wife, Jan Sterling, at a restaurant,
and I realized he was perfect, and I asked him right there in the
parking lot. About two days before we were to start, he had a heart
attack and died. Iz and I were shattered."
Any contributions will be
gratefully accepted
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