Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Remembering Gerald Mohr


Gerald Mohr was born on June 11, 1914 in New York City. Mohr’s father died when he was three and he was raised by his mother and grandfather.  Under the guidance of his grandfather, Gerald attended the distinguished Dwight Preparatory School in New York and entered Columbia University with hopes of becoming a doctor when he fell ill with appendicitis.  His roommate in the hospital was a radio broadcaster and suggested that Mohr look to a career on radio
 
Mohr's big break in radio was in Orson Welles Mercury Theatre Company and he greatly impressed Welles, who later recommended Mohr for bigger roles in film and radio.  He left show business briefly during WWII as he served for three years on United States Air Force.  Throughout his career, he worked in countless movies, numerous television, animated shows and radio series. Fluent in German and French, Gerald Mohr played Jacque Monet in ‘Our Miss Brooks’.
 
Often compared to Humphrey Bogart, Mohr pretty much defines "cool" with a smooth delivery of lines and a laid back persona.  There are a few campy B-movies on Gerald Mohr's resume such as: “Invasion USA” (1952), “Terror in a Haunted House” (1958), “Guns, Girls and Gangsters” (1959).  Shortly after completing the pilot of a new TV series called ‘Private Entrance’, Gerald Mohr died of a heart attack in the evening of November 9, 1968, in Södermalm, Stockholm, at the age of 54.
 
In 1964 Mohr, together with his second wife Mai Dietrich, planned the formation of an international film company, headquartered in Stockholm, with Swedish and American writers. The company was to have featured comedy, adventure, crime and drama shows for worldwide distribution. By then fluent in Swedish, he also planned to star in a film for TV in which his character, a newspaperman, would speak only Swedish. In 1964 he made a comedy Western, filmed in Stockholm and on location in Yugoslavia, called Wild West Story  in which, unusually, the good guys spoke Swedish and the bad guys (including Mohr) spoke in English.
 
In 1968 he flew to Stockholm, to star in the pilot of a proposed television series called ‘Private Entrance’, featuring Swedish film and TV actress Christina Schollin. Shortly after the completion of filming, Mohr died of a heart attack in the evening of November 9, 1968, in Södermalm, Stockholm, at the age of 54
 
Today we remember Gerald Mohr on what would have been his 100th birthday.

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