| 47th | Top U.S. Coast Guard people |
| Henry Wilcoxon | |
|---|---|
 as the vicar in The Miniver Story (1950) |
|
| Born | Harry Frederick Wilcoxon September 8, 1905 Roseau, Dominica, British West Indies |
| Died | March 6, 1984 (aged 78) Los Angeles, California, U.S. (heart failure; cancer) |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1931–1983 |
| Spouse(s) | Heather Angel (?-?) Sheila Garret (1936-1937) (divorced) Joan Woodbury (1938-?) (divorced) 3 children |
Henry Wilcoxon (September 8, 1905 – March 6, 1984) was an actor born in Roseau, Dominica, British West Indies, and best known as a leading man in many of Cecil B. DeMille's films, also serving as DeMille's associate producer on his later films.
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Henry Wilcoxon was born Harry Frederick Wilcoxon on September 8, 1905 in Roseau, Dominica. His father was Robert Stanley Wilcoxon (known as "Tan"), wealthy manager of the Colonial Bank in Jamaica,[1] and his mother Lurline Minuette Nunes, who had been a theatre actress and producer."[1][2][3]
Following is a summary of the early childhood of Henry (Harry) and his brother Robert Owen Wilcoxon (Owen), from his autobiography.[4]
Harry and Owen were known as 'Biff' and 'Bang' to friends and family due to fighting skills gained in amateur boxing and public houses.
After completing his education, Wilcoxon was employed by Joseph Rank, the father of J. Arthur Rank, before working for Bond Street tailors Pope and Bradshaw.[2] While working for the tailors, Wilcoxon applied for a visa to work as a chauffeur in the United States, but upon seeing his application refused, turned to acting.[2]
Wilcoxon's first stage performance "was in the E. M. Dell play The 100th Chance," before he joined the Birmingham Repertory Theatre and toured "for several years" playing "all roles that came his way."[2] Among these roles, he found critical success playing Captain Cook in a production of Rudolph Besier's The Barretts of Wimpole Street at the Queen's Theatre alongside Gwen Ffrangcon-Davies, Scott Sunderland and Cedric Hardwicke.[2]
In 1931, Wilcoxon made his screen debut appearing as "Larry Tindale" in The Perfect Lady (AKA The Lovelorn Lady), swiftly followed by a role opposite Heather Angel in Self Made Lady, alongside Louis Hayward and others.[2] In 1932, he appeared in a remake of the 1929 film The Flying Squad (based on the novel by Edgar Wallace), reprising the role originated by future-Hitchcock regular John Longden.[2]
Also in 1932, "while acting on stage in Eight Bells, a talent scout for Paramount Pictures reportedly arranged a screen test which came to the attention of producer-director Cecil B. DeMille in Hollywood."[2] DeMille recalls in his autobiography:
Wilcoxon was next given the lead role of Richard the Lion-Hearted in DeMille's big-budget film The Crusades (1935) opposite Loretta Young. That film, however, was a financial failure, "losing more than $700,000".[2] After the lack of success of The Crusades, Wilcoxon's career stalled; although he featured—and starred—in a number of films, most were "minor B's like The President's Mystery and Prison Nurse for Republic [Pictures]."[2] Wilcoxon himself deemed "his worst acting job [to be] in Mysterious Mr. Moto (1938), in which year he played in If I Were King and featured in Five of a Kind with the Dionne quintuplets.[2]
In 1936 Wilcoxon married Sheila Browning, but divorced her not long after. On December 17, 1938 he married Joan Woodbury an actress, who, according to film critic Don Daynard, "continued her career but never graduated from the minors," featuring in such films as Barnyard Follies, In Old Cheyenne and Brenda Starr, Reporter.[2][7]
In 1941, Wilcoxon appeared as Captain Hardy, alongside Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh, in Alexander Korda's Lady Hamilton, during the filming of which:
When America entered the war in December, 1941, Wilcoxon enlisted in the US Coast Guard, supposedly "leaving his home twenty minutes after the announcement that the States had declared war and proceeding to enlist then and there."[2] He served with the Coast Guard until 1946, gaining the rank of Lieutenant.[2]
During his period of service, he had three films released in 1942, among them Mrs. Miniver,[8] which received considerable public acclaim, as well as six Academy Awards.[2] Wilcoxon, in his role as the vicar, "wrote and re-wrote" the key sermon with director William Wyler "the night before the sequence was to be shot."[2] The speech "made such an impact that it was used in essence by President Roosevelt as a morale builder and part of it was the basis for leaflets printed in various languages and dropped over enemy and occupied territory."[2]
Upon his return from war service, Wilcoxon "picked up his relationship with Cecil B. DeMille," and after starring as Sir Lancelot in the 1949 musical version of Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (with Bing Crosby in the title role), he featured (with "fifth starring billing") in DeMille's Samson and Delilah (1949).[2] To help pre-sell the film, "DeMille arranged for Wilcoxon to tour the country giving a series of lectures on the film and its research in 41 key cities in the United States and Canada."[2] However, "after the fourteenth city," Wilcoxon collapsed "from a mild bout of pneumonia," and the tour was continued by "press-agent Richard Condon and Ringling Brothers public relations man Frank Braden" (who also collapsed, in Minneapolis).[2] Condon finished touring by the time of the films release in October, 1949.[2] Wilcoxon, meanwhile, had returned to England under contract to feature in The Miniver Story (1950), a sequel to the multi-Oscar-winning Mrs. Miniver (1942) in which he reprised his role as the vicar.
In the early 1950s, "several young actors and actresses came to Wilcoxon and wife Joan Woodbury and asked them to form a play-reading group", which began to take shape as 'the Wilcoxon Players' in 1951, when the two "transformed their living room into a stage."[2] 'Guest star' performers sometimes appeared in the plays produced by the group, among them Larry Parks and Corinne Calvet, and soon the "Wilcoxon Group Players Annual Nativity Play" was being performed "at the Miles Playhouse in Santa Monica."[2] The group was recognized by the American Cancer Society in 1956 with a Citation of Merit, awarded for donations received by attendees of the groups Easter productions.[2]
Wilcoxon played a "small but important part" in DeMille's 1952 production The Greatest Show on Earth, on which film he also served as Assistant Producer, helping steer the film towards its Academy Award for Best Picture, 1952.[2] He also acted as associate producer on, and acted (as the pharaoh's captain of the guards) in, DeMille's remake of his own The Ten Commandments (1956). Wilcoxon was sole producer on the 1958 film The Buccaneer, a remake of DeMille's 1938 effort, which DeMille only "supervized" while Anthony Quinn directed.[2]
After DeMille died, Wilcoxon did "considerable work... in pre-production" on "a film based on the life of Lord Baden-Powell, founder of the Boy Scout movement," which DeMille had left unrealized, and was also ultimately abandoned.[2]
After a relatively inactive period "for the next nine years," Wilcoxon had a "chance meeting with actor Charlton Heston and director Franklin Schaffner at Universal studios," a meeting which saw him appear in The War Lord (1965), for which he again "went on tour... visiting 21 cities to publicize the picture."[2]
He was credited as co-producer on a "90-minute tribute to Cecille B. DeMille televised by NBC" entitled The World's Greatest Showman: The Legend of Cecil B. DeMille (1963), which production was hampered by the absence of "some of DeMille's best-remembered films of the 30s and 40s" when rights-holder MCA refused their use.[2] At the opening of the DeMille Theatre in New York, he produced a "two-reel short," that in the estimation of critic Don Miller "was much better than this 90-minute tribute."[9]
In the last two decades of his life, he worked sporadically and accepted minor acting roles in a number of television and film productions. He appeared in shows including Daniel Boone, Perry Mason, I Spy, It Takes a Thief, Wild Wild West and Gunsmoke as well as in a smaller number of films, including a memorable turn as the golfer-turned-atheist Bishop Pickering in the 1980 comedy classic Caddyshack.[2]
He has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Wilcoxon was an amateur painter, whose work was exhibited on at least one occasion in London.[2] He was also "an avid antique collector and accomplished flier."[2] With his wife Joan Woodbury, he had three daughters: Wendy Joan, Heather Ann and Cecilia Dawn.[2]
A few years before he died, Henry had an emotional meeting with his niece Valerie (b. 1933), the English daughter of his brother Owen[10] with Dorothy Drew (sister of architect Jane Drew). Up till then he did not know that his brother, killed at the Dunkirk evacuation, had any children.
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