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Bradford Dillman

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Bradford Dillman
Dillman on an episode of The F.B.I. (1966).
Born(1930-04-14)April 14, 1930
San Francisco, California, U.S.
DiedJanuary 16, 2018(2018-01-16) (aged 87)
Santa Barbara, California, U.S.
EducationYale University (B.A., 1951)
Actors Studio
Occupations
  • Actor
  • author
Years active1953–1995
Spouses
    Frieda Harding McIntosh
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1956; div. 1962)​
      ​
      ​
      (m. 1963; died 2003)​
      Children5
      RelativesAimée Crocker (cousin)
      Military career
      Allegiance United States of America
      Branch
      		 United States Marine Corps
      Service years
      		1951-1953
      Rank
      		1st Lieutenant
      Conflicts
      		Korean War
      Signature

      Bradford Dillman (April 14, 1930 – January 16, 2018) was an American actor and author, who appeared in over 140 film, television, and stage productions between 1953 and 1995.[1] He originated the role of Edmund Tyrone in Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night, earning a Theatre World Award, and won the 1959 Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actor for his performance in the film Compulsion. He was also a Golden Globe Award winner and a Primetime Emmy Award nominee.

      Early life

      Bradford Dillman was born on April 14, 1930, in San Francisco, the son of Dean Dillman, a stockbroker, and Josephine (née Moore).[2] Bradford's paternal grandparents were Charles Francis Dillman and Stella Borland Dean. He studied at Town School for Boys and St. Ignatius High School from which he graduated in 1949.[3] He later attended the Hotchkiss School in Connecticut, where he became involved with school theatre productions. While at Yale University, he enlisted in the U.S. Naval Reserve in 1948. While a student, he was a member of the Yale Dramatic Association, Fence Club, Torch Honor Society, The Society of Orpheus and Bacchus, WYBC and Berzelius.[4] He graduated from Yale in 1951 with a BA in English Literature.[5][4]

      Military service

      After graduation, he entered the United States Marine Corps as an officer candidate, training at Parris Island. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Marine Corps in September 1951. As he was preparing to deploy to the war in Korea, his orders were changed, and he spent the rest of his time in the Marine Corps, from 1951 to 1953, teaching communication in the Instructors' Orientation Course. He was discharged in 1953 with the rank of first lieutenant.[5]

      Career

      Studying with the Actors Studio,[6] Dillman spent several seasons apprenticing with the Sharon Playhouse in Sharon, Connecticut.[7] He was offered a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, but declined it to star in an Off-Broadway production of The Scarecrow in 1953.[8][9]

      During 1955, he appeared in an episode of the television series The Big Picture as an MP patrolling the city of Augusta, Georgia.

      Broadway

      Dillman first performed in a Broadway play as part of the U.S. premiere cast of Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night in November 1956. He portrayed the author's alter-ego character Edmund Tyrone and won a Theatre World Award for his performance. The production also featured Fredric March, Florence Eldridge and Jason Robards Jr., and played for 390 performances until March 1958.[10]

      In 1957, Katharine Cornell cast him in a Hallmark Hall of Fame television production of Robert E. Sherwood's Pulitzer Prize winning 1940 play, There Shall Be No Night.[11]

      20th Century Fox

      Dillman was cast in the movie melodrama A Certain Smile (1958). He followed this with In Love and War (1958), a war movie featuring many of 20th Century Fox's young contract players, for which he earned a Golden Globe award.[12] It was a financial success. So too was Compulsion (1959), featuring Dillman, Dean Stockwell and Orson Welles for producer Richard Zanuck and director Richard Fleischer.[13]

      Dillman shared an award for Best Actor with Stockwell and Welles at the Cannes Film Festival.[14] After making the movie Circle of Deception (1960) in London, Dillman was reunited with Welles, Fleischer and Zanuck for Crack in the Mirror (1960), filmed in Paris.[15] It was unsuccessful. Back in Hollywood, Fox cast Dillman in support of Yves Montand and Lee Remick in Sanctuary (1961). They also had him in the title role in Francis of Assisi (1961).[16]

      Television

      When he quit Fox, Dillman mostly concentrated on television. He guest-starred in a 1963 episode of The Virginian, titled: "Echo of Another Day", and he guest-starred in the 1966 12 O'Clock High episode "Twenty-Fifth Mission". He co-featured with Diana Hyland in the Alfred Hitchcock Hour episode "To Catch A Butterfly" in February 1963, and with Barbara Barrie in the 1964 Hitchcock Hour episode "Isabel". He appeared in seven episodes of Dr. Kildare (1964–66) and 26 of Court Martial (1965–66).[17][18] He guest-featured in television series such as The F.B.I. (six episodes), Ironside (two episodes), Shane, The Name of the Game, Columbo, The Wild Wild West, Night Gallery, The Eleventh Hour, Wagon Train, The Greatest Show on Earth, Breaking Point, Mission: Impossible (two episodes), The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Cannon, Barnaby Jones (six episodes), Three for the Road, Wonder Woman and a two-part episode of The Man from U.N.C.L.E., which was made into the feature movie The Helicopter Spies (1968).[19][20]

      Dillman appeared twice in the Western television series The Big Valley (1965–69), once in season two, episode 15, titled "Day of the Comet", broadcast December 26, 1966; and the second time in season three, episode 9, titled "A Noose is Waiting", which was broadcast November 13, 1967.[21] He appeared in occasional movies during this period, including A Rage to Live (1965), Sergeant Ryker (1968), and The Bridge at Remagen (1969).[22]

      Dillman played painter Richard Pickman in the television adaptation of H. P. Lovecraft's 1926 story, Pickman's Model, presented as the opening act of a December 1971 Night Gallery episode.[23] In 1970 Bradford played the role of a U.S. Army captain in the TV film Suppose They Gave A War and Nobody Came. He starred as Tony Goodland in "The Greenhouse Jungle", the second episode of the second season of Columbo (initially aired on October 15, 1972). He also starred as the sadistic hunter Michael Sutton in "The Snare", the ninth episode in the third season of The Incredible Hulk (initially aired on December 7, 1979).

      Later career and author

      Dillman appeared in made-for-television movies such as Fear No Evil (1969), Moon of the Wolf (1972), and Deliver Us from Evil (1973).[22] His film work included Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971), The Way We Were (1973), Gold (1974), Bug (1975), The Enforcer (1976), The Swarm (1978), Piranha (1978), Sudden Impact (1983), and Lords of the Deep (1989).[24] He appeared in 10 episodes of Falcon Crest (1982–83), and 2 of Dynasty (1984). His last known acting appearance was an episode of Murder, She Wrote in 1995, his eighth guest appearance on the series.[22]

      Dillman's football fan book, Inside The New York Giants, was published in 1995.[25] An autobiography, Are You Anybody?: An Actor's Life, was published in 1997.[26]

      Personal life

      "Bradford Dillman" was the actor's real name. He'd said "It [Bradford Dillman] sounded like a distinguished, phony, theatrical name -- so I kept it."[27] He lived for many years in the 1928-built Las Armas estate, designed by architects George Washington Smith and Lutah Maria Riggs, in Montecito, California.[28]. From 1956 to 1962, he was married to Frieda Harding and had two children with her, Pamela and Jeffrey.

      During the production of Circle of Deception (1960), he met Suzy Parker, a Long Island-born fashion model and pupil of Coco Chanel, who had moved to Hollywood and appeared in a number of movies, including The Best of Everything, and, after a while, he divorced Harding.[29] Dillman and Parker married on April 20, 1963, and had three children, Dinah, Charles, and Christopher.[30] The marriage lasted until Parker died on May 3, 2003, at their Montecito home, after a long battle with kidney failure.[30] The Beatles's 1970 documentary Let It Be featured a non-commercially released song titled "Suzy Parker" that was written by all four of them, with lyrics referring to the famous model.[31]: 246 

      Dillman was a distant cousin of the eccentric author and heiress Aimee Crocker. Crocker's cousin on her mother’s side was Charles Frances Dillman, grandfather of Bradford, who was president of the D.O. Mills National Bank and represented both Aimée’s and sister Jennie’s extensive business interests in California.[32]

      Dillman was involved in supporting medical research that he would help raise money for.[29]

      Death

      Dillman died in Santa Barbara, California, on January 16, 2018, aged 87, due to complications from pneumonia.[33]

      Partial filmography

      Film

      Television

      Stage credits

      Year Title Role Venue
      1953 Pygmalion Freddie Sharon Playhouse, Sharon, CT
      Candida Marchbanks
      You Touched Me Hadrian
      The Scarecrow Richard Talbot Theatre de Lys, New York
      1954 The Madwoman of Chaillot Pierre Sharon Playhouse, Sharon, CT
      Death of a Salesman Happy Loman
      The Browning Version Young Teacher
      Night Must Fall Danny
      1955 Third Person Kip Ames President Theatre, New York
      Inherit the Wind Ensemble member[9] National Theatre, New York
      The Corn Is Green Morgan Sharon Playhouse, Sharon, CT
      The Barretts of Wimpole Street Octavius
      Ring Round the Moon Hugo/Frédéric
      Counsellor-at-Law The Radical
      1956 The Rainmaker Jimmy
      1956–58 Long Day's Journey into Night Edmund Tyrone Helen Hayes Theatre, New York
      1962 The Fun Couple Gill Stanford Lyceum Theatre, New York

      Awards and nominations

      Institution Year Category Work Result Ref.
      Cannes Film Festival 1959 Best Actor Compulsion Won[a] [34]
      Daytime Emmy Awards 1975 Outstanding Actor in a Daytime Drama Special The ABC Afternoon Playbreak ("Last Bride of Salem") Won [35]
      Golden Globe Awards 1959 New Star of the Year – Actor In Love and War Won[b] [36]
      Primetime Emmy Awards 1963 Outstanding Single Performance by a Lead Actor Alcoa Premiere ("The Voice of Charlie Pont") Nominated [37]
      Theatre World Award 1957 —N/a Long Day's Journey into Night Won [10]

      References

      1. Bernstein, Adam (January 19, 2018). "Bradford Dillman, multifaceted and prolific actor of stage and screen, dies at 87". The Washington Post. Retrieved January 23, 2018.
      2. "Bradford Dillman Biography". filmreference.com; Retrieved April 11, 2015.
      3. "GENESIS, The Quarterly Magazine of St. Ignatius College Preparatory, San Francisco" (PDF). Spring 2018.
      4. Yale Class of 1951 Banner and Pot Pourri (yearbook). New Haven, Conn: Yale University. 1951.
      5. Wise, James E.; Anne Collier Rehill (1999). "Bradford Dillman". Stars in the Corps: Movie actors in the United States Marines (2nd ed.). Naval Institute Press. pp. 91–98. ISBN 978-1-55750-949-9. Retrieved March 21, 2009.
      6. Garfield, David (1980). "Appendix: Life Members of The Actors Studio as of January 1980". A Player's Place: The Story of The Actors Studio. New York: MacMillan. p. 278. ISBN 978-0-0254-2650-4.
      7. O'Neill, Laurie A. (1982-06-20). "NEW CAST AND GOAL FOR SHARON THEATER". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-06-03.
      8. "Overview for Bradford Dillman". Turner Classic Movies. Archived from the original on November 5, 2011.
      9. Quirk, Lawrence J. (1959-04-19). "DOING WHAT COMES NATURALLY WITH DILLMAN; Dedication Is Keynote of the Acting Career of a Star in 'Compulsion'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-06-03.
      10. "Long Day's Journey Into Night – Broadway Play – Original". Internet Broadway Database.
      11. "Hallmark Hall of Fame: There Shall Be No Night (1957) - George Schaefer - Synopsis, Characteristics, Moods, Themes and Related". AllMovie. Archived from the original on 2018-03-13. Retrieved 2018-03-12.
      12. "Bradford Dillman". Golden Globes.
      13. "Compulsion (1959) - Richard Fleischer - Synopsis, Characteristics, Moods, Themes and Related". AllMovie.
      14. "Compulsion (1959) - Richard Fleischer - Awards". AllMovie.
      15. "Crack in the Mirror (1960)". AFI-Catalog. Retrieved January 4, 2021.
      16. "Francis of Assisi (1961)". British Film Institute. Archived from the original on October 9, 2016.
      17. "The Alfred Hitchcock Hour: Isabel (1964) - Alf Kjellin - Synopsis, Characteristics, Moods, Themes and Related". AllMovie.
      18. "Court-Martial". TV Guide.
      19. "Bradford Dillman". TV Guide.
      20. Newman, Kim (January 26, 2007). "The Helicopter Spies". Empire.
      21. "The Big Valley (a Titles & Air Dates Guide)". epguides.com.
      22. "Bradford Dillman - Movies and Filmography". AllMovie.
      23. Gaita, Paul (October 27, 2009). "Honored Horror: 'Night Gallery: Pickman's Model'". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved January 4, 2021.
      24. "Bradford Dillman". AFI-Catalog.
      25. Dillman, Bradford; Giddings, Mike (June 22, 1994). Inside the New York Giants. Third Story Books. ISBN 978-1884506161.
      26. Dillman, Bradford (June 22, 1997). Are you anybody?: an actor's life. Fithian Press. ISBN 978-1564741998.
      27. Bernstein, Adam (January 19, 2018). "Bradford Dillman, multifaceted and prolific actor of stage and screen, dies at 87". The Washington Post. Retrieved April 1, 2026.
      28. Thornton, Jenn (2026). "The Manor Reborn". The Santa Barbara Magazine. Retrieved April 1, 2026.
      29. "Bradford Dillman: Orson Welles: The View from Mount Olympus". American Legends. Retrieved January 4, 2021.
      30. Martin, Douglas (May 6, 2003). "Suzy Parker, Willowy Model And Actress of 50's, Dies at 69". The New York Times. Retrieved April 1, 2026.
      31. Winn, John C. (2009). That Magic Feeling: The Beatles' Recorded Legacy, Volume Two, 1966-1970. Crown Publishing Group. ISBN 9780307452399.
      32. Taylor, Kevin (April 8, 2019). "Suzy Parker, Supermodel". Aimee Crocker. Retrieved April 1, 2026.
      33. Barnes, Mike (January 21, 2018). "Bradford Dillman, Actor in 'Compulsion' and 'The Way We Were,' Dies at 87". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved March 31, 2026.
      34. "Personne". Cinéma de Demain. Retrieved 2026-06-01.
      35. Astor, Maggie (2018-01-22). "Bradford Dillman, Star of Broadway and Hollywood, Dies at 87". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-06-01.
      36. "Winners & Nominees 1959". www.goldenglobes.com. Archived from the original on 2019-04-13. Retrieved 2026-06-01.
      37. "Bradford Dillman | Emmy Awards and Nominations". Television Academy. Retrieved 2026-06-01.

      Notes