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Donald O'Connor Biography |
Donald O'Connor (August 28, 1925 - September 27, 2003) was a singer, dancer and actor who came to fame in a series of movies in which he co-starred with Francis, the talking mule. He is still best known for his performance in the movie musical Singing in the Rain.
O'Connor was born into an Irish immigrant family of vaudeville entertainers. As a toddler, he and his sister were involved in a road accident, which resulted in her death. His father died of a heart attack only a few weeks later. Yet it was as a comedy actor and a song-and-dance man that he became famous. His boyish looks did not allow him to take a romantic lead, except when appearing with a bigger star such as Ethel Merman (in Call Me Madam) or Bing Crosby (with whom he appeared in his first film at the age of eleven). However, he did have a separate Hollywood career in the late 1930s, in which he played such incongruous roles as Beau Geste. During World War II, he was re-invented as a star of musical films.
When the heyday of the film musical was over, O'Connor returned to the stage, and had a short-lived television series during the late 1960s. After overcoming a drinking problem in the 1970s, he continued to make film and television appearances into the 1990s. O'Connor was still making public appearances well into 2003.
Among his last words, he is reported to have expressed thanks for the Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement which he expected to win at some future date. He left his wife, Gloria, and four children.
Screen appearances
It Can't Last Forever - 1937
Men with Wings - 1938
Sing You Sinners - 1938
Sons of the Legion - 1938
Tom Sawyer, Detective - 1938
Boy Trouble - 1939
Unmarried - 1939
Million Dollar Legs - 1939
Beau Geste - 1939
Death of a Champion - 1939
On Your Toes - 1939
Night Work - 1939
What's Cookin'? - 1942
Private Buckaroo - 1942
Give Out, Sisters - 1942
Get Hep to Love - 1942
When Johnny Comes Marching Home - 1942
It Comes Up Love - 1943
Mister Big - 1943
Top Man - 1943
Chip Off the Old Block - 1944
This Is the Life - 1944
The Merry Monahans - 1944
Bowery to Broadway - 1944
Patrick the Great - 1945.
Something in the Wind - 1947
Are You with It? - 1948
Feudin', Fussin' and A-Fightin - 1948
Yes Sir That's My Baby - 1949
Francis - 1950 - first of the "talking mule" movies
Curtain Call at Cactus Creek - 1950
The Milkman - 1950
Double Crossbones - 1951
Francis Goes to the Races - 1951
Singin' in the Rain - 1952
Francis Goes to West Point - 1952
I Love Melvin - 1953
Call Me Madam - 1953
Francis Covers the Big Town - 1953
Walking My Baby Back Home - 1953
Francis Joins the WACS - 1954
There's No Business Like Show Business - 1954
Francis in the Navy - 1955
Anything Goes - 1956
The Buster Keaton Story - 1957
Cry for Happy - 1961
Le Meraviglie di Aladino - 1961
That Funny Feeling - 1965
The Donald O'Connor Show - 1968 (television series)
Ragtime - 1981
Pandemonium - 1982
Alice in Wonderland - 1983 (made for television)
Alice in Wonderland - 1985 (made for television)
A Time to Remember - 1987
Toys - 1992
Bandit: Bandit's Silver Angel - 1994 (made for television)
Father Frost - 1996
Out to Sea - 1997 |
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