Guy Madison
Acting • Born 1922-01-19 – Died 1996-02-06
Biography
Handsome American leading man Guy Madison stumbled into a film career and became a television star and hero to the Baby Boom generation. As a young man he worked as a telephone lineman, but entered the Coast Guard at the beginning of the Second World War. While on liberty one weekend in Hollywood, he attended a Lux Radio Theatre broadcast and was spotted in the audience by an assistant to Henry Willson, an executive for David O. Selznick. Selznick wanted an unknown sailor to play a small but prominent part in Since You Went Away (1944), and promptly signed Robert Moseley to a contract. Selznick and Willson concocted the screen name Guy Madison (the "guy" girls would like to meet, and Madison from a passing Dolly Madison cake wagon). Madison filmed his one scene on a weekend pass and returned to duty. The film's release brought thousands of fan letters for Madison's lonely, strikingly handsome young sailor, and at war's end he returned to find himself a star-in-the-making. Despite an initial amateurishness to his acting, Madison grew as a performer, studying and working in theatre. He played leads in a series of programmers before being cast as legendary lawman Wild Bill Hickok in the TV series Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok (1951). He played Hickok on TV and radio for much of the 1950s, and many of the TV episodes were strung together and released as feature films. Madison managed to squeeze in some more adult-oriented roles during his off-time from the series, but much of this work was also in westerns. After the Hickok series ended Madison found work scarce in the U.S. and traveled to Europe, where he became a popular star of Italian westerns and German adventure films. In the 1970s he returned to the U.S., but appeared mainly in cameo roles. Physical ailments limited his work in later years, and he died from emphysema in 1996. His first wife was actress Gail Russell. Date of Birth 19 January 1922, Pumpkin Center, California Date of Death 6 February 1996, Palm Springs, California (emphysema)
Filmography
77 credits
The Last Frontier
Movie • 1955
Captain Glenn Riordan
Where's Willie?
Movie • 1978
Tony Flore
Old Shatterhand
Movie • 1964
Capt. Bradley
Since You Went Away
Movie • 1944
Sailor Harold E. Smith
5 Against the House
Movie • 1955
Al Mercer
Los Angeles Plays Itself
Movie • 2004
Cliff Harper in Till the End of Time (archive footage)
Legacy of the Incas
Movie • 1965
Jaguar / Karl Hansen
When the West Was Fun: A Western Reunion
Movie • 1979
Self
This Man Can't Die
Movie • 1968
Martin Benson
Five for Revenge
Movie • 1966
Tex
Reverend's Colt
Movie • 1970
Miller Colt
Son of Django
Movie • 1967
Father Fleming
Women of Devil's Island
Movie • 1962
Henri Vallière
Till the End of Time
Movie • 1946
Cliff W. Harper
The Beast of Hollow Mountain
Movie • 1956
Jimmy Ryan
Bullwhip
Movie • 1958
Steve Daley
The Command
Movie • 1954
Capt. Robert MacClaw
Jet Over The Atlantic
Movie • 1959
Brett Murphy
Drums in the Deep South
Movie • 1951
Maj. Will Denning
Payment in Blood
Movie • 1967
Colonel Thomas Blake
The War Devils
Movie • 1969
Capt. George Vincent
The Bang-Bang Kid
Movie • 1967
Bear Bullock
Hilda Crane
Movie • 1956
Russell Burns
Gunmen Of The Rio Grande
Movie • 1964
Wyatt Earp / Laramie
The Hard Man
Movie • 1957
Steve Burden
Gentlemen of the Night
Movie • 1964
Massimo
Reprisal!
Movie • 1956
Frank Madden
Return of Sandokan
Movie • 1964
Yanez
Blood of the Executioner
Movie • 1963
Rodrigo Zeno
The Charge at Feather River
Movie • 1953
Miles Archer
On the Threshold of Space
Movie • 1956
Capt. Jim Hollenbeck
Texas, Brooklyn & Heaven
Movie • 1948
Eddie Tayloe
Adventurer of Tortuga
Movie • 1965
Alfonso di Montélimar
Honeymoon
Movie • 1947
Corporal Phil Vaughn
The Battle of the Last Panzer
Movie • 1969
Lofty
Behind Southern Lines
Movie • 1952
Wild Bill Hickok
Sword of the Conqueror
Movie • 1961
Amalchi
Slave of Rome
Movie • 1961
Marco Valerio
Sandokan Fights Back
Movie • 1964
Yanez
Massacre River
Movie • 1949
Larry Knight
Red Snow
Movie • 1952
Lt. Phil Johnson
Hell Commandos
Movie • 1969
Major Carter
Kidnapped to Mystery Island
Movie • 1964
Souyadhana
The Yellow Haired Kid
Movie • 1952
Wild Bill Hickok
Trail of the Arrow
Movie • 1952
Wild Bill Hickok
Trouble on the Trail
Movie • 1954
Wild Bill Hickok
Six Gun Decision
Movie • 1953
Marshal James Butler 'Wild Bill' Hickok
Secret of Outlaw Flats
Movie • 1953
Marshal James Butler 'Wild Bill' Hickok
Outlaw's Son
Movie • 1954
Wild Bill Hickok
The Matchmaking Marshal
Movie • 1955
Wild Bill Hickok
Two Gun Marshal
Movie • 1953
Wild Bill Hickok
Marshals in Disguise
Movie • 1954
Wild Bill Hickok
The Tilted Tenderfoot
Movie • 1955
Wild Bill Hickok
A Place In Hell
Movie • 1969
Major Mac Graves
Superargo and the Faceless Giants
Movie • 1968
Prof. Wendland Wond
Border City Rustlers
Movie • 1953
Wild Bill Hickok
Hell in Normandy
Movie • 1968
Capt. Jack Murphy
The Pacific Connection
Movie • 1974
The Old Man
LSD Flesh of Devil
Movie • 1967
Rex Miller
The Devil's Man
Movie • 1967
Mike Harway
Red River
Movie • 1988
Bill Meeker, Rancher
The Ghost of Crossbone Canyon
Movie • 1952
Marshal James Butler 'Wild Bill' Hickok
The Two Gun Teacher
Movie • 1954
Wild Bill Hickok
Phantom Trails
Movie • 1955
Wild Bill Hickok
Timber Country Trouble
Movie • 1955
Wild Bill Hickok
The Silk Worm
Movie • 1974
Robert, Smeralda's ex-husband
Not One Shall Die
Movie • 1957
Stefan Gross
Won Ton Ton: The Dog Who Saved Hollywood
Movie • 1976
Star at Screening
Crossbow: The Movie
Movie • 1989
Gerrish
General Electric Theater
TV • 1953
Adam Tenney
Schlitz Playhouse of Stars
TV • 1951
Climax!
TV • 1954
The Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok
TV • 1951
Wild Bill Hickok
Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theatre
TV • 1956
Jericho - Federal Agent
The Ford Television Theatre
TV • 1952
John Harpurhey
What's My Line?
TV • 1950
Self
Crossbow
TV • 1987