You know, all these years, and I never knew that Ray Milland was a Welsh actor?!?!?! Anyways, Ray was born on this day in 1907. He is best known for his his Academy Award- and Cannes Film Festival Award-winning portrayal of an alcoholic writer in Billy Wilder's
The Lost Weekend (1945). Milland was born Alfred Reginald Jones in Neath, Wales, the son of Elizabeth Annie (née Truscott) and steel mill superintendent Alfred Jones. He was schooled independently before attending the private King's College School in Cardiff. He also worked at his uncle's horse-breeding farm before leaving home at age 21. Of his parents, he wrote in his 1974 autobiography:
My father was not a cruel or harsh man. Just a very quiet one. I think he was an incurable romantic and consequently a little afraid of his emotions and perhaps ashamed of them ... he had been a young hussar in the Boer War and had been present at the relief of Mafeking. He never held long conversations with anyone, except perhaps with me, possibly because I was the only other male in our family. The household consisted of my mother, a rather flighty and coquettish woman much concerned with propriety and what the neighbours thought.
Prior to becoming an actor, Milland served in the Household Cavalry. An expert shot, he became a member of his company's rifle team, winning many prestigious competitions, including the Bisley Match in England. He won the British Army Championship in both pistol and rifle marksmanship. However, acting was his true calling. His first appearance on film was as an uncredited extra on the E.A. Dupont film
Piccadilly (1929). After some unproductive extra work, which never reached the screen, he signed with a talent agent named Frank Zeitlin on the recommendation of fellow actor Jack Raine.
Milland's first experience in making a Hollywood film resulted in a humiliating scene on the set of
Son of India (1931), when the film's director Jacques Feyder berated Milland's acting in front of the entire crew. Despite this setback, the studio executives talked Milland into staying in Hollywood, and in 1930, he appeared in his first US film
Passion Flower. Over the next two years, Milland appeared in minor parts for MGM and a few films for which he was lent to Warner Bros.; he was often uncredited. His largest role during this period was as Charles Laughton's nephew in
Payment Deferred (1932).
After a bunch of little roles with little work, Ray returned to England. However, he was contacted by Joe Pasternak, who was looking for an 'English' actor for the lead in his new picture, Three Smart Girls (1936). Although Pasternak worked for Universal Studios, Paramount had agreed to lend Milland out for the film.
On returning to Paramount after Three Smart Girls was wrapped, Milland was used as a test actor to find a new starlet for The Jungle Princess (1936). When the studio chose Dorothy Lamour for the lead, Milland wrote in his autobiography that Lamour was confused to find that he was not to be her male lead and she requested Milland to be her co-star. Paramount was not keen, but when Three Smart Girls was released to rave reviews, they gave Milland the role. The rest is movie history...
