Richard Cromwell (actor)

Richard Cromwell (born LeRoy Melvin Radabaugh; January 8, 1910 – October 11, 1960) also known as Roy Radabaugh, was an American actor.

In 1918, when Radabaugh was still in grade school, his father died suddenly, one of the millions of people who perished during the "Spanish flu" pandemic.

Radabaugh enrolled as a teenager in the Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles on a scholarship.

He ran a shop in Hollywood where he sold pictures, made lampshades, and designed colour schemes for houses, including "decorating a bathroom for Colleen Moore and designing a house that he rented to Cole Porter."

Radabaugh can be seen in King of Jazz (1930), along with the film's star, Paul Whiteman and his orchestra.

On a whim, friends encouraged him to audition in 1930 for the remake of the Richard Barthelmess silent: Tol'able David (1930).

Radabaugh won the role over thousands of hopefuls.

In storybook fashion, Harry Cohn gave him his screen name and launched his career.

Cromwell earned $75 per week for his work on Tol'able David.

Noah Beery Sr. and John Carradine co-starred in the film.

Later, Cohn signed Cromwell to a multi-year contract based on the strength of his performance and success in his first venture at the box-office.

Amidst the flurry of publicity during this period, Cromwell toured the country, even meeting President Herbert Hoover in Washington, D.C.

Dressler was nominated for a second Best Actress award for her 1932 portrayal of the title role in Emma.

With that film, Dressler demonstrated her profound generosity to other performers: Dressler personally insisted that her studio bosses cast Cromwell on a loan-out in the lead opposite her.

This was another break that helped sustain his rising status in Hollywood.

Emma also starred Myrna Loy in one of her earlier screen performances.

Cromwell's next role in 1932 was as Mike in Gregory La Cava's, The Age of Consent, co-starring Eric Linden and Dorothy Wilson.

Cromwell is also remembered during this period in Hoop-La (1933), where he is seduced by Clara Bow.

Next, the much in demand Cromwell starred in Tom Brown of Culver.

Next up was an early standout performance by Cromwell as the leader of the youth gang in Cecil B. DeMille's now cult-favorite, This Day and Age (1933).

To ensure that Cromwell's character used current slang, DeMille asked high school student Horace Hahn to read the script and comment.

Cromwell by then had maintained a deep friendship with Marie Dressler, which continued until her death from cancer in 1934.

He starred with Jean Arthur in 1934, in "The Most Precious Thing in Life."

After a promising start, Cromwell's many early pictures at Columbia Pictures and elsewhere were mostly inconsequential.

Cromwell's fame was perhaps first assured in The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935), sharing top billing with Gary Cooper and Franchot Tone.

That film was the first major effort directed by Henry Hathaway and it was based upon the popular novel by Francis Yeats-Brown.

The Lives of a Bengal Lancer earned Paramount Studios a nomination for Best Picture in 1935, though Mutiny on the Bounty instead took the top award at the Academy Awards that year.

Leslie Halliwell in The Filmgoer's Companion, summed up Cromwell's enduring appeal when he described him as "a leading man, [the] gentle hero of early sound films."

Cromwell was born LeRoy Melvin Radabaugh in Long Beach, California, the second of five children, to his mother Fay B. (née Stocking) and his father, Ralph R. Radabaugh, who was an inventor.

Cromwell starred with Will Rogers in Life Begins at 40 for Fox Film Corporation in 1935 and appeared in Poppy in 1936 as the suitor of W.C. Fields' daughter, Rochelle Hudson.

In 1936, Cromwell took a detour in his career to Broadway for the chance to star as an evil cadet in an original play by Joseph Viertel, So Proudly We Hail!.

The military drama was directed by future film director Charles Walters, co-starred Edward Andrews and Eddie Bracken, and opened to much fanfare.

The reviews of the play at the time called Cromwell's acting "a striking portrayal" (New York Herald Tribune) and his performance an "astonishing characterization" (New York World Telegram).

The New York Times said that in the play, Cromwell "ran the gamut of emotions".

In 1937, he portrayed the young bank-robber in love with Helen Mack and on the lam from Lionel Atwill in The Wrong Road.

On July 15, 1937, Cromwell guest-starred on The Royal Gelatin Hour hosted by Rudy Vallee, in a dramatic skit opposite Fay Wray.

Enjoying the experience, Cromwell had his agent secure for him an audition for the role of Kit Marshall on the soap opera Those We Love, first on NBC Radio and then on CBS Radio.

His career was at its pinnacle with his work in Jezebel (1938) with Bette Davis and Henry Fonda and again with Fonda in John Ford's Young Mr. Lincoln (1939).

However, the play closed after only 14 performances at the 46th Street Theater.

By now, Cromwell had shed his restrictive Columbia contract and pursued acting work as a freelancer in other media.