José Vicente Ferrer de Otero y Cintrón (January 8, 1912 – January 26, 1992) was a Puerto Rican actor and director of stage, film and television. He was one of the most celebrated and esteemed Hispanic American actors during his lifetime and after, with a career spanning nearly 60 years between 1935 and 1992. He achieved prominence for his portrayal of Cyrano de Bergerac in the play of the same name, which earned him the inaugural Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play in 1947. He reprised the role in a 1950 film version and won an Academy Award for Best Actor, making him both the first Hispanic and the first Puerto Rican–born actor to win an Academy Award.
His other notable film roles include Charles VII in Joan of Arc (1948), Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec in Moulin Rouge (1952), defense attorney Barney Greenwald in The Caine Mutiny (1954), Alfred Dreyfus in I Accuse! (1958), which he also directed; the Turkish Bey in Lawrence of Arabia (1962), Siegfried Rieber in Ship of Fools (1965), and Emperor Shaddam IV in Dune (1984). Ferrer also maintained a prolific acting and directing career on Broadway, winning a second Best Actor Tony for The Shrike, and Best Director for The Shrike, The Fourposter, and Stalag 17. Additionally, Ferrer appeared numerous times in the works of Shakespeare, notably as Iago in Othello.
Ferrer was the father of actor Miguel Ferrer, the brother of Rafael Ferrer, the grandfather of actress Tessa Ferrer, and the uncle of actor George Clooney. His contributions to American theatre were recognized in 1981 when he was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame. In 1985, he received the National Medal of Arts from President Reagan, becoming the first actor so honored.
Ferrer was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, the son of Rafael Ferrer, a local attorney and writer, and María Providencia Cintrón, of Yabucoa. He was the grandson of Gabriel Ferrer Hernández, a doctor and advocate of Puerto Rican independence from Spain. He had two younger sisters, Elvira and Leticia. As a consequence of being born into a wealthy family, his upbringing was influenced by the arts, music and humanities.
The family moved to New York in 1914, when Ferrer was two years old, following the death of his mother. He studied part of his elemental education at Colegio San José in Río Piedras. From there, Ferrer was enrolled at the Swiss boarding school Institut Le Rosey. He was interested in literature, music and painting, but only the first of these was widespread there. Ferrer, who had speech issues early in his life, went on to learn five languages, including Spanish, English, French, and Italian.
In 1933, Ferrer completed his bachelor's degree in architecture at Princeton University, where he wrote his senior thesis on "French Naturalism and Pardo Bazán". Ferrer was also a member of the Princeton Triangle Club and played piano in a band, "José Ferrer and His Pied Pipers". At Princeton he took part in plays by James Stewart and Joshua Logan. His studies in architecture gave him insight on painting techniques. Bret Bush of the Triangle Club convinced him to participate in an audition that changed his life. Ferrer then studied Romance languages at Columbia University for 1934–35.
Ferrer's first professional appearance as an actor was at a "showboat" theater on Long Island in the summer of 1934.
In 1935, Ferrer was the stage manager at the Suffern Country Playhouse, operated by Joshua Logan, whom Ferrer had known at Princeton. Ruth Gordon and Helen Hayes recommended him to the theatrical producer Jed Harris.
Ferrer made his Broadway debut in 1935 in A Slight Case of Murder which ran for 69 performances.
He was also seen in Stick-in-the-Mud (1935) and Spring Dance (1936). Ferrer's first big success was in Brother Rat (1936–38) which ran for 577 performances. In Clover only ran for three performances. How to Get Tough About It (1938) also had a short run, as did Missouri Legend (1938).
Mamba's Daughters (1939) ran for 163 performances. Ferrer followed it with Key Largo (1939–40) with Paul Muni and directed by Guthrie McClintic, which went for 105 shows and was later turned into a film.
Ferrer had a huge personal success in the title role of Charley's Aunt (1940–41), partly in drag, under the direction of Joshua Logan. It went for 233 performances.
Ferrer then replaced Danny Kaye in the musical Let's Face It! (1943).
Ferrer made his debut on Broadway as director with Vickie (1942) in which he also starred. It only had a short run.
He played Iago in Margaret Webster's Broadway production of Othello (1943–44), which starred Paul Robeson in the title role, Webster as Emilia, and Ferrer's wife, Uta Hagen, as Desdemona. That production still holds the record for longest-running repeat performance of a Shakespearean play presented in the United States, going for 296 performances (it would be revived in 1945).
Ferrer produced and directed, but did not appear in, Strange Fruit (1945–46), starring Mel Ferrer (no relation).
Among other radio roles, Ferrer starred as detective Philo Vance in a 1945 series of the same name.
Ferrer may be best remembered for his performance in the title role of Cyrano de Bergerac, which he first played on Broadway in 1946. Ferrer feared that the production would be a failure in rehearsals, due to the open dislike for the play by director Mel Ferrer (no relation), so he called in Joshua Logan (who had directed his star-making performance in Charley's Aunt) to serve as "play doctor" for the production. Logan wrote that he simply had to eliminate pieces of business which director Ferrer had inserted in his staging; they presumably were intended to sabotage the more sentimental elements of the play that the director considered to be corny and in bad taste. The production became one of the hits of the 1946/47 Broadway season, winning Ferrer the first Best Actor Tony Award for his depiction of the long-nosed poet/swordsman.