111 Facts About Robert Cummings

Charles Clarence Robert Orville Cummings was an American film and television actor who appeared in roles in comedy films such as The Devil and Miss Jones and Princess O'Rourke, and in dramatic films, especially two of Alfred Hitchcock's thrillers, Saboteur and Dial M for Murder.

Robert Cummings received five Primetime Emmy Award nominations, and won the Primetime Emmy Award for Best Actor in a Single Performance in 1955.

Robert Cummings used the stage name Robert Cummings from mid-1935 until the end of 1954 and was credited as Bob Cummings from 1955 until his death.

Robert Cummings's father was a surgeon, part of the original medical staff of St John's Hospital in Joplin, and the founder of the Jasper County Tuberculosis Hospital in Webb City, Missouri.

Robert Cummings's mother was an ordained minister of the Science of Mind.

Robert Cummings, born in 1910, would have only been 8 years old when Orville Wright had essentially stopped flying as a result of injuries he sustained in an accident at Fort Myer, Virginia, on September 17,1918.

The report that Orville Wright taught Robert Cummings to fly is contradicted by Robert Cummings' interview reported in the March 1960 Flying magazine.

Robert Cummings studied briefly at Drury College in Springfield, Missouri, but his love of flying caused him to transfer to the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh.

Robert Cummings studied aeronautical engineering for a year before he dropped out for financial reasons, his family having lost heavily in the 1929 stock market crash.

Robert Cummings became interested in acting while performing in plays at Carnegie Tech, and decided to pursue it as a career.

Since the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City paid its male actors $14 a week, Robert Cummings decided to study there.

Robert Cummings started looking for work in 1930, but couldn't find any roles, forcing him to get a job at a theatrical agency.

Robert Cummings was driving a motorbike through the countryside, picking up the accent and learning about the country, when his bike broke down at Harrogate.

Robert Cummings invented the name "Blade Stanhope Conway" and bribed the janitor of a local theatre to put on the marquee: "Blade Stanhope Conway in Candida".

Robert Cummings then had a photo taken of himself in front of the marquee and had 80 prints made.

Robert Cummings later said pretending to be Conway broke up his first marriage, to a girl from Joplin.

Robert Cummings was an extra in the Laurel and Hardy comedy film Sons of the Desert and in the musical short Seasoned Greetings.

Robert Cummings appeared under this name in the Ziegfeld Follies of 1934, which ran from January to June in 1934.

Robert Cummings had a duet with Vivi Janiss, a native of Nebraska, with whom he sang "I Like the Likes of You".

Robert Cummings returned to New York, then heard King Vidor was looking for Texan actors for So Red the Rose.

Robert Cummings auditioned, pretending to be a Texan, having acquired his own version of a Texan accent by listening to cowboy bands on the radio.

Robert Cummings's ruse was exposed, but Vidor nevertheless cast him, under his actual name.

Robert Cummings followed this with a part in Paramount's The Virginia Judge.

Robert Cummings appeared as one of the leads in the Western Desert Gold, then had a supporting role in Forgotten Faces and a starring part in Three Cheers for Love.

Robert Cummings had a small role in an A picture, Souls at Sea, then appeared in Sophie Lang Goes West, Wells Fargo and College Swing.

Robert Cummings had a small role in You and Me, and was in The Texans and Touchdown, Army.

In November 1938, Robert Cummings auditioned for the romantic lead in Three Smart Girls Grow Up, starring Deanna Durbin, for producer Joe Pasternak.

Pasternak was reluctant to cast him, preferring to find a musician, but Robert Cummings told him, "I could fake it".

Robert Cummings's first film for them, Three Smart Girls Grow Up was a big success, and in March 1939 Universal took up their options on the actor.

Robert Cummings had that marvelous comedy talent and a romantic quality.

Robert Cummings supported Basil Rathbone and Victor McLaglen in Rio, then was borrowed by 20th Century Fox to romance Sonia Henie in Everything Happens at Night.

Back at Universal, Robert Cummings was the romantic male lead in a comedy, Private Affairs ; then he romanced Durbin again in Spring Parade.

Robert Cummings made his mark in the CBS Radio network's dramatic serial titled Those We Love, which ran from 1938 to 1945.

Robert Cummings played the role of David Adair in the serial drama Those We Love, opposite Richard Cromwell, Francis X Bushman and Nan Grey.

Robert Cummings played a union leader, Jean Arthur's love interest, under the direction of Sam Wood.

Robert Cummings shot the film at the same time as Free and Easy.

Wallis did not have any contract players at Warner Bros who were considered ideal for the role of Paris, and, after trying desperately to get Tyrone Power, he tried to borrow Robert Cummings, who had done an impressive test.

However, Robert Cummings was busy on It Started with Eve and the actor had to drop out.

Robert Cummings played Barry Kane, an aircraft worker wrongfully accused of espionage, trying to clear his name.

In December 1941, John Chapman said Robert Cummings was among "the most sought-after leading men in town" and was one of his "stars for 1942".

Robert Cummings filmed it concurrently with a Hal Wallis movie at Warner Bros, and Princess O'Rourke, Norman Krasna's directorial debut.

Robert Cummings was meant to be in We've Never Been Licked for Walter Wanger at Universal, but did not appear in the film.

In December 1941, Robert Cummings joined the fledgling Civil Air Patrol, an organization of citizens and pilots interested in helping support the US war effort.

In November 1942, Robert Cummings joined the United States Army Air Forces.

Robert Cummings played aircraft pilots in several of his postwar film roles.

Robert Cummings was meant to be in Fired Wife with Teresa Wright, Charles Coburn, and Eddie Anderson and a director "comparable with" Leo McCarey.

Robert Cummings notified the studio in May 1943 that he considered himself no longer under contract.

In September 1943, Robert Cummings sued the studio for withheld wages of $10,700, arguing that for some time, Universal tried to put him in minor roles to "run him ragged" and "to teach him a lesson".

In March 1944, the court ruled in Robert Cummings's favor, saying Universal had voided its contract with the actor and owed him $10,700.

The Army Air Forces pilot Robert Cummings played, Bob Collins, died off camera, but was resurrected 10 years later for Robert Cummings's television show.

Robert Cummings was announced for Dishonorable Discharge for Wallis from a story by John Farrow, but it appears to have not been made.

Robert Cummings had the leads in two films for Nero Films, a company of Seymour Nebenzal and Eugene Frenke, who released through United Artists: a film noir, The Chase ; and a Western, Heaven Only Knows.

Robert Cummings decided to form his own production company with Frenke and Philip Yordan, which they called United California.

In 1947, Robert Cummings had reportedly earned $110,000 in the preceding12 months.

Robert Cummings was initially meant to follow it with The Big Curtain for Edward Alperson at Fox but that picture was never produced.

Robert Cummings appeared in Sleep, My Love, another noir, directed by Douglas Sirk and produced by Mary Pickford.

Robert Cummings announced a series of projects for United California: Ho the Fair Wind from a novel by IAR Wylie, The Glass Heart by Mary Holland, Poisonous Paradise, Passport to Love by Howard Irving Young, and a remake of Two Hearts in Three Quarter Time.

Robert Cummings was trying to interest Norman Krasna into writing the story of how Robert Cummings broke into acting, to be called Pardon My Accent.

Robert Cummings did The Accused for Hal Wallis at Paramount, supporting Loretta Young.

Robert Cummings did a comedy at Universal, Free for All.

In July 1949, Robert Cummings signed a three-picture deal with Columbia.

Robert Cummings made Tell It to the Judge, with Rosalind Russell, for them.

Robert Cummings did one for Wallis at Paramount, Paid in Full, then went back to Columbia for The Petty Girl a musical with Joan Caulfield.

Robert Cummings did announce he would make The Glass Heart for his own company and release through Columbia, but this did not happen.

Robert Cummings supported Clifton Webb in For Heaven's Sake at Fox, then played a con man in The Barefoot Mailman, his third film for Columbia.

Robert Cummings began working in television, appearing in Sure as Fate and Somerset Maugham TV Theatre.

Robert Cummings was in a Broadway play Faithfully Yours, which had a short run in late 1951.

Robert Cummings was one of the four stars featured in the short-run radio version of Four Star Playhouse.

Robert Cummings was offered Battle in Spain, the story of El Cid, with Linda Darnell, but turned it down because it was too controversial.

Robert Cummings starred in his first regular television series in the comedy My Hero, playing a bumbling real estate salesman.

The series ran for 33 episodes before Robert Cummings decided to end it and accept other offers.

Robert Cummings was in Marry Me Again at RKO for Tashlin, then went to England to star in another Hitchcock film, Dial M for Murder, playing the lover of Grace Kelly, whose husband Ray Milland tries to kill her.

Robert Cummings then supported Doris Day in a musical at Warner Bros, Lucky Me.

Robert Cummings was chosen by producer John Wayne as his co-star to play airline pilot Captain Sullivan in The High and the Mighty, partly due to Cummings's flying experience; however, director William A Wellman overruled Wayne and hired Robert Stack for the part.

In 1954, Robert Cummings appeared in Twelve Angry Men, an original TV play for Westinghouse Studio One written by Reginald Rose and directed by Franklin Schaffner, alongside actors including Franchot Tone and Edward Arnold.

Robert Cummings played Juror Number Eight, the role taken by Henry Fonda in the feature-film adaptation.

Robert Cummings's performance earned him the 1955 Emmy Award for Best Actor in a Single Performance.

In July 1954, Robert Cummings formed his own independent film production company, Laurel Productions, Incorporated.

In July 1954, Robert Cummings filmed the pilot for his television show, The Bob Robert Cummings Show, and would go on to produce 173 episodes.

In January 1955, The Bob Robert Cummings Show began airing, and went through 1959.

Robert Cummings starred on the successful NBC sitcom, The Bob Robert Cummings Show, where he played Bob Collins, a former World War II pilot who became a successful professional photographer.

Robert Cummings's co-stars were Rosemary DeCamp as his sister Margaret MacDonald; Dwayne Hickman as his nephew Chuck MacDonald; and Ann B Davis, in her first television success, as his assistant Charmaine "Schultzy" Schultz.

When Robert Cummings appeared on the NBC interview program Here's Hollywood, he was seen by Nunnally Johnson, who cast him opposite Betty Grable in How to Be Very, Very Popular at Fox, which turned out to be Grable's last film.

Robert Cummings's contract was amended to allow him time off to rehearse and record his TV show.

Robert Cummings was one of the hosts on ABC's live broadcast of the opening day of Disneyland on July 17,1955, along with Ronald Reagan and Art Linkletter.

Robert Cummings turned down The Heavenly Twins for the Theatre Guild; and was mentioned for Bewitched by Charles Bennett in England, but did not do it.

Robert Cummings returned to Studio One, and did episodes of General Electric Theater, The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show, and Schlitz Playhouse.

When his TV show ended in 1959, Robert Cummings claimed it was his decision, as he was tired and wanted to take a year off.

Robert Cummings was keen to sell the show into syndication.

In 1960, Robert Cummings starred in "King Nine Will Not Return", the opening episode of the second season of CBS's The Twilight Zone, written by Serling and directed by Buzz Kulik.

The New Bob Robert Cummings Show followed on CBS for one season, from 1961 to 1962.

Robert Cummings returned to films with a supporting role in My Geisha, written by Krasna.

Robert Cummings was top-billed in Beach Party, although the film is better remembered today for first teaming Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello.

Robert Cummings had the lead in Five Golden Dragons for producer Harry Alan Towers and supported in Gidget Grows Up.

Robert Cummings was in another Broadway play, The Wayward Stork, which had a short run in early 1966.

Robert Cummings guest-starred again on Theatre of Stars, as well as The Flying Nun, Green Acres, Here Come the Brides, Arnie, Bewitched, Here's Lucy, and several episodes of Love, American Style.

Robert Cummings relayed those experiences in the written introduction he provided for the book Airstream written by Robert Landau and James Phillippi in 1984.

Robert Cummings had a cameo in Three on a Date and appeared in 1979 as Elliott Smith, the father of Fred Grandy's Gopher on ABC's The Love Boat.

In 1986, Robert Cummings hosted the 15th-anniversary celebration of Walt Disney World on The Wonderful World of Disney.

Robert Cummings's third wife, Mary Elliott, was a former actress and she ran Cummings's business affairs.

Robert Cummings claimed he relied on astrologers and numerologists to make financial decisions with "disastrous" consequences.

Robert Cummings was married to Gina Fong from 1971 to 1987 and married Martha Burzynski two years later.

Robert Cummings was an avid pilot and owned a number of airplanes, all named "Spinach".

Robert Cummings was a staunch advocate of natural foods and published a book on healthy living, Stay Young and Vital, in 1960.

In 1952, Robert Cummings was sued by a writer of My Hero who had been fired.

In 1952, Robert Cummings was served with papers concerning the suit by LA County Deputy Sheriff William Conroy; Robert Cummings assaulted Conroy and was then sued by the sheriff for damages.

Robert Cummings explained that he didn't know Conroy was a deputy.

In 1954, while in New York to star in the Westinghouse Studio One production of Twelve Angry Men, Robert Cummings began receiving injections from Max Jacobson, the notorious "Dr Feelgood".

Robert Cummings allegedly continued to use a mixture provided by Jacobson, eventually becoming a patient of Jacobson's son Thomas, who was based in Los Angeles, and later injecting himself.

The changes in Robert Cummings's personality caused by the euphoria of the drug and subsequent depression damaged his career and led to an intervention by his friend, television host Art Linkletter.

Robert Cummings is interred in the Great Mausoleum at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Glendale, California.