Victor John Mature was an American stage, film, and television actor who was a leading man in Hollywood during the 1940s and 1950s.
61 Facts About Victor Mature
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Victor Mature's best known film roles include One Million BC, My Darling Clementine, Kiss of Death, Samson and Delilah, and The Robe.
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Victor Mature appeared in many musicals opposite such stars as Rita Hayworth and Betty Grable.
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Victor Mature's father, Marcello Gelindo Maturi, later Marcellus George Mature, was a cutler and knife sharpener from Pinzolo, in the Italian part of the former County of Tyrol.
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Victor Mature's mother, Clara P, was Kentucky-born and of Swiss heritage.
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Victor Mature's only sister, Isabelle, was born and died in 1906.
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Victor Mature attended St Xavier High School in Louisville, Kentucky, the Kentucky Military Institute, and the Spencerian Business School.
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Victor Mature briefly sold candy and operated a restaurant before moving to California.
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Victor Mature was spotted by Charles R Rogers, an agent for Hal Roach, while acting in a production of To Quito and Back.
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Victor Mature was worried about the direction of his career at this stage, claiming "nobody was going to believe I could do anything except grunt and groan," so he went to New York City to try the theatre.
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Victor Mature signed to appear in a play with the Group Theatre, Retreat to Pleasure by Irwin Shaw.
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Shortly afterward it was announced he would appear instead in the musical Lady in the Dark with a book by Moss Hart and songs from Ira Gershwin and Kurt Weill; Victor Mature played Randy Curtis, a film star boyfriend of the show's protagonist, magazine editor Liza Elliott.
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Victor Mature's performance was well received, Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times calling him "unobjectionably handsome and affable".
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When Victor Mature left Lady in the Dark, he announced that 20th Century Fox had bought out half of Victor Mature's contract with Hal Roach.
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Victor Mature was going to follow this with The Shanghai Gesture for Arnold Pressburger and Josef von Sternberg at United Artists.
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Bowery Nightingale was not made, so Fox instead assigned Victor Mature to appear in a thriller with Faye, I Wake Up Screaming ; Faye ended up being replaced with Betty Grable.
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Victor Mature was announced for a Fox musical, Highway to Hell, which ended up being postponed; instead, he replaced John Payne in a Betty Grable musical, Song of the Islands.
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Victor Mature was paid $450 a week under his contract with Roach for Shanghai Gesture, but Roach received $3750 a week for Victor Mature's services.
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Victor Mature asked for a pay increase of $1,250 a week.
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In July 1942, Victor Mature attempted to enlist in the US Navy but was rejected for color blindness.
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Victor Mature enlisted in the US Coast Guard after taking a different eye test the same day.
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Victor Mature assisted Coast Guard recruiting efforts by being a featured player in the musical revue Tars and Spars, which opened in Miami, Florida, in April 1944 and toured the United States for the next year.
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Victor Mature was honorably discharged from the Coast Guard in November 1945 and he resumed his acting career.
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Victor Mature was pulled off that film to play Philip Marlowe in an adaptation of The High Window.
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However Victor Mature ended up withdrawing from that film and instead was cast by John Ford in My Darling Clementine, playing Doc Holliday opposite Henry Fonda's Wyatt Earp, considered to be one of his finest performances.
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Still at Fox, Victor Mature made his second Western, Fury at Furnace Creek, replacing John Payne.
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Victor Mature still had an obligation to make a movie at RKO, which dated from before the war.
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Victor Mature was announced for Battleground and before eventually being cast in a serious drama about football, Interference, which became Easy Living in 1949, with Lucille Ball.
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Victor Mature returned to Fox and was put in a popular musical with Betty Grable, Wabash Avenue.
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In late 1949, Victor Mature was meant to fulfill another commitment at RKO, Alias Mike Fury.
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Victor Mature refused to make the movie and was put on suspension by Fox.
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The script was rewritten and Victor Mature ended up making the film, which was retitled Gambling House.
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Victor Mature took a number of months off, before returning to filmmaking with The Las Vegas Story, with Jane Russell at RKO.
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Back at Fox, Victor Mature was meant to be reteamed with Betty Grable in a musical, The Farmer Takes a Wife, but the studio instead reassigned him to a comedy with Patricia Neal, Something for the Birds.
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Back at RKO, Victor Mature was meant to star in Split Second, but instead was reteamed with Jean Simmons in the romantic drama Affair with a Stranger.
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Victor Mature followed this with a movie at Universal, The Veils of Bagdad.
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In December 1952, Victor Mature signed to play Demetrius in two movies, The Robe and a sequel, Demetrius and the Gladiators.
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Back at RKO, Victor Mature made Dangerous Mission for producer Irwin Allen.
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Victor Mature travelled to Holland in September 1953 to support Clark Gable and Lana Turner in a World War Two film made at MGM, Betrayed, another popular success.
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Victor Mature was originally meant to co-star with Marlon Brando and Kirk Douglas.
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Victor Mature renewed his contract with Fox for another year, his 12th at that studio.
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The Egyptian ended up starring Victor Mature with Edmund Purdom and Michael Wilding, plus Bella Darvi; it was a box-office disappointment.
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Victor Mature went over to Universal to play the title role in Chief Crazy Horse, in exchange for a fee and a percentage of the profits.
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In 1954, Victor Mature signed a two-picture deal with Columbia Pictures, giving him script and co-star approval, at $200,000 a film.
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In March 1955, while making Last Frontier, Victor Mature announced he had signed a contract with United Artists for them to finance and distribute six films over five years for Victor Mature's own company.
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In May 1955, Victor Mature signed a two-picture contract with Warwick Productions.
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Victor Mature ended up making Safari beforehand, a tale of the Mau Mau with location filming in Kenya.
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Victor Mature was back with Warwick for Interpol, reteaming him with his Zarak co-star, Anita Ekberg, filmed throughout Europe.
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Victor Mature finally made a movie for his own production company, Romina Productions, in conjunction with United Artists and Batjac Productions: China Doll, directed by Frank Borzage, with whom Victor Mature co-produced.
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Victor Mature signed to make two more films with Warwick Productions, No Time to Die and The Man Inside.
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Victor Mature ended up only making the first, a World War Two film with Libyan locations; Jack Palance took his role in The Man Inside.
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Victor Mature made another movie for Romina and Batjac, a Western, Escort West.
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Victor Mature was reunited with producer Irwin Allen for The Big Circus, shot in early 1959.
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Victor Mature then made his second film for Warwick under his two-picture contract with them, The Bandit of Zhobe, following this with an Italian peplum, aka "sword-and-sandal" movie, Hannibal, with Mature in the title role.
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Victor Mature played "Tony Powell", an aging American actor who is living off his reputation from his earlier body of work.
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Victor Mature came out of retirement again in 1971 to star in Every Little Crook and Nanny and again in 1976 along with many other former Hollywood stars in Won Ton Ton, the Dog Who Saved Hollywood.
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Victor Mature's last feature film appearance was a cameo as a millionaire in Firepower in 1979, while his final acting role was that of Samson's father Manoah in the TV movie Samson and Delilah in 1984.
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Victor Mature was engaged to Rita Hayworth, before she married Orson Welles, and to Anne Shirley.
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Victor Mature died of leukemia in 1999 at his Rancho Santa Fe, California, home, at the age of 86.
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Victor Mature was buried in the family plot, marked by a replica of the Angel of Grief, at St Michael's Cemetery in his hometown of Louisville.
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The band had since opted for something a little more West Coast, so Buck considered Hornets Attack Victor Mature to be fair game.