Gig Young (born Byron Elsworth Barr; November 4, 1913 – October 19, 1978) was an American actor. He was active in film, television, and theater from the late 1930s through the 1970s, and was initially known for his portrayals of characters with "light-hearted sophistication." He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969), with two previous nominations for Come Fill the Cup (1952) and Teacher's Pet (1959).
Young's career was hampered by a troubled personal life. Dissatisfied with the quality of roles, his worsening alcoholism caused him to lose several high-profile parts, severely hurting his career prospects. In 1978, Young murdered his 31-year-old wife three weeks after their wedding before turning the gun on himself and committing suicide at the age of 64.
Born Byron Elsworth Barr in St. Cloud, Minnesota, he and his older siblings were raised by his parents, John and Emma Barr, in Washington, D.C., where his father was a reformatory chef. He attended McKinley High School, where he developed his first love of acting appearing in school plays.
After graduating from high school he worked as a used car salesman and studied acting at night. He moved to Hollywood when a friend offered him a ride if he would pay for half the gas. After some amateur experience, he applied for and received a scholarship to the Pasadena Playhouse. "I had two jobs to support me, never rested, but it was great training and when I landed the part at Warner Bros., I was ready for it," he said.
Barr made early appearances in Misbehaving Husbands (1940), credited as "Byron Barr", and in the short Here Comes the Cavalry (1941). While acting in Pancho, a south-of-the-border play by Lowell Barrington, he and the leading actor in the play, George Reeves, were spotted by a Warner Brothers talent scout. Both actors were signed to supporting player contracts with the studio.
His early work was uncredited or as Byron Barr (not to be confused with another actor with the same name, Byron Barr) or Byron Fleming. It included appearances in Sergeant York (1941), Dive Bomber (1941), Navy Blues (1941), and One Foot in Heaven (1941). Barr had a bigger part in a short, The Tanks Are Coming (1941) which was nominated for an Oscar.
He was also in They Died with Their Boots On (1941) and You're in the Army Now (1941). He had an uncredited bit part in the 1942 Bette Davis film The Man Who Came to Dinner, saying, in his distinctive voice, "How's the ice?." He was also in Captains of the Clouds (1942), and The Male Animal (1942). Warners loaned him to Fox for The Mad Martindales (1942).
The Gay Sisters and becoming Gig Young
In 1942, six months into his Warner Brothers contract, he was given his first notable role in the feature film The Gay Sisters as a character named "Gig Young". Preview cards praised the actor "Gig Young" and the studio determined that "Gig Young" should become Barr's stage and professional name. About the name change, Young later admitted to having "some hesitancy... but I weighed the disadvantages against the advantages of having it stick indelibly in the mind of audiences. There'd be no confusion with some other actor called Gig." His parts began to get better: a co-pilot in Howard Hawks' Air Force (1943); and Bette Davis' love interest in Old Acquaintance (1943).
Young took a hiatus from his movie career and enlisted in the U.S. Coast Guard in 1941, where he saw combat service as a pharmacist's mate in the Pacific Theatre through the end of World War II. On Young's return stateside, he was cast as Errol Flynn's rival for Eleanor Parker in Escape Me Never (1947). The film was directed by Peter Godfrey, who also helmed Young and Parker in The Woman in White (1948), after which Young left Warners, unhappy with his salary.
Young began freelancing at various studios, eventually obtaining a contract with Columbia Pictures before returning to freelancing. He came to be regarded as a popular and likable second lead, playing the brothers or friends of the principal characters. In a 1966 interview he said, "Whenever you play a second lead and lose the girl, you have to make your part interesting yet not compete with the leading man. There are few great second leads in this business. It's easier to play a lead – you can do whatever you want. If I'm good, it always means the leading man has been generous."
Young was Porthos in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's The Three Musketeers (1948). Then he supported John Wayne in Wake of the Red Witch (1948) at Republic Pictures and Glenn Ford in Columbia's Lust for Gold (1949). Also at Columbia, he supported Rosalind Russell and Robert Cummings in Tell It to the Judge (1949). Young had his first lead in a feature film at RKO in Hunt the Man Down (1951), a film noir. He went back to support roles for Target Unknown (1951) a war film at Universal; and Only the Valiant (1951), a Gregory Peck western.
Young began to appear in TV on shows such as The Silver Theatre, Pulitzer Prize Playhouse, and The Bigelow Theatre.
Come Fill the Cup and first Oscar nomination
Young received critical acclaim for his dramatic work as an alcoholic in the 1951 film Come Fill the Cup, with James Cagney back at Warner Brothers. He was nominated for both an Oscar and Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor. Young later gave Cagney a great deal of the credit for his performance.
Young supported Van Johnson in the MGM comedy Too Young to Kiss (1952). The studio liked Young so much that he was signed to a term contract. After supporting Peter Lawford in You for Me (1952), Young was promoted by MGM to leading man for Holiday for Sinners (1952). The film was a box office failure, however. More popular was The Girl Who Had Everything (1953) in which Young lost Elizabeth Taylor to Fernando Lamas.
MGM loaned Young to Republic Pictures for City That Never Sleeps (1953), where he had the starring role as a disillusioned cop. In 2008 Martin Scorsese selected this film to open a Republic Pictures retrospective that he curated at New York's Museum of Modern Art, citing the movie's amazing energy and creativity. Back at MGM, Young was the lead in the 3-D western Arena (1953), which was a hit. He was a second male lead again – to Michael Wilding – in the Joan Crawford vehicle Torch Song (1953). Promptly after completing both films, on June 22, 1953, the trade magazine Hollywood Reporter told its readers that MGM had just assigned Gig Young to the fourth leading role in their film Gypsy Colt. Likely noticing that his roles were now moving in the wrong direction, he left MGM. "I played terrible parts there", he later said. He decided to relocate to New York.
Young said he rarely performed in comedies until he appeared on Broadway in Oh Men! Oh Women! (1953–54), which ran for 382 performances. Young recalled, "It was a big smash hit but never helped change my type in Hollywood for quite some time. I still played dull, serious parts like Errol Flynn's brother. Yet on Broadway, they offered me nothing but comedies."