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Spencer Tracy (April 5, 1900 – June 10, 1967) was a two-time Academy Award-winning American film actor who appeared in 74 films from 1930 to 1967. He is often described as one of the finest actors in motion picture history. In 1999, the American Film Institute named Tracy among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time, ranking at No. 9.
Career He was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the second son of John Edward Tracy, an Irish American Catholic truck salesman, and Caroline Brown, a Protestant turned Christian Scientist, and was christened Spencer Bonaventure Tracy. Tracy's paternal grandparents, John Tracy and Mary Guhin, were born in Ireland. His mother's ancestry dates back to Thomas Stebbins, who immigrated from England in the late 1630s. Tracy attended six high schools, starting with Wauwatosa High School (1915-1916), and St. John's Cathedral School for boys in Milwaukee (autumn 1916). The Tracy family then moved to Kansas City, where Spencer was enrolled at St. Mary's Academy, a boarding school near Topeka, Kansas, then transferred to Rockhurst, a Jesuit academy in Kansas City, Missouri. John Tracy's job in Kansas City did not work out, and the family returned to Milwaukee six months after their departure. Spencer was enrolled at Marquette Academy, another Jesuit school, where he met fellow actor Pat O'Brien. The two left school in spring 1917 to enlist in the Navy with the American entry into World War I, but Tracy remained in Norfolk Navy Yard, Virginia throughout the war. Afterwards, Tracy continued his high school education at Northwestern Military and Naval Academy in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, but finished his studies at Milwaukee's West Division High School (now Milwaukee High School of the Arts) in February 1921. Afterward he attended Ripon College where he appeared in a leading role in a play entitled The Truth, and decided on acting as a career. While touring the Northeast with the Ripon debate team, he auditioned for and was accepted to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York. His first Broadway role was as a robot in Karel Čapek's R.U.R. (1922), followed by five other Broadway plays in the 1920s. In 1923 he married fellow actor Louise Treadwell. They had two children, John and Louise (Susie). For several years he performed in stock in Michigan, Canada, and Ohio. Finally in 1930 he appeared in a hit play on Broadway, The Last Mile. Director John Ford saw Tracy in The Last Mile and signed him to do Up the River for Fox Pictures. Shortly after that he and his family moved to Hollywood, where he made over 25 films in five years. In 1935 Tracy signed with Metro Goldwyn Mayer. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor two years in a row, for Captains Courageous (1937) and Boys Town (1938). He was also nominated for San Francisco (1936), Father of the Bride (1950), Bad Day at Black Rock (1955), The Old Man and the Sea (1958), Inherit the Wind (1960), Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967). He and Laurence Olivier share the record for the most best actor Oscar nominations (9). In 1941, Tracy began a relationship with Katharine Hepburn, whose agile mind and New England brogue complemented Tracy's easy working-class machismo very well. Though estranged from his wife Louise, he was a devout Roman Catholic and never divorced. He and Hepburn made nine films together. Seventeen days after filming had completed on his last film, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, with Hepburn, he died from heart failure at the age of 67. Almost forty years after his death, Tracy is still widely considered one of the most skillful actors of his time. He could portray the hero, the villain, or the comedian, and make the audience believe he truly was the character he played. In the 1944 film The Seventh Cross, for example, he was effective as an escaped prisoner from a German concentration camp despite his heavy-set build. Tracy was one of Hollywood's earliest "realistic" actors; his performances have stood the test of time. Actors have noted that Tracy's work in 1930s films sometimes looks like a modern actor interacting with the more stylized and dated performances of everyone around him. A new full length biography of Spencer Tracy is currently being written by James Curtis, author of the acclaimed 2003 biography of W.C. Fields. In 1988, the University of California, Los Angeles' Campus Events Commission and Susie Tracy created the UCLA Spencer Tracy Award. The award has been given to actors in recognition for their achievement in film acting. Past recipients include William Hurt, Jimmy Stewart, Michael Douglas, Denzel Washington, Tom Hanks, Sir Anthony Hopkins, Jodie Foster, Harrison Ford, Angelica Houston, Nicolas Cage, Kirk Douglas, Jack Lemmon and Morgan Freeman. Filmography Books Quotes Trivia | ||||||||
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