Ronald Charles Colman (9 February 1891 – 19 May 1958) was an English actor who started his career in theatre and silent film in his native country, then emigrated to the United States, where he had a highly successful Hollywood film career. Colman starred in silent films and successfully transitioned to sound, aided by his distinctive, pleasing voice. He was most popular during the 1930s and 1940s. Colman received Oscar nominations for Bulldog Drummond (1929), Condemned (1929), and Random Harvest (1942). He starred in several classic films, including A Tale of Two Cities (1935), Lost Horizon (1937), and The Prisoner of Zenda (1937). Colman also played the starring role in the Technicolor classic Kismet (1944), with Marlene Dietrich. In 1947, he won an Academy Award for Best Actor and Golden Globe Award for Best Actor for his performance in the film A Double Life.
Colman received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his work in motion pictures and later was awarded a second star for his television work.
Ronald Charles Colman was born on 9 February 1891 at Woodville, 156 Sandycombe Road (renamed and renumbered 7 Broomfield Road), in Richmond, Surrey, England, the third son (his eldest brother died in infancy in 1882) and fifth child of Charles Colman,note1 a silk merchant and mantle manufacturer, and his wife Marjory Read Fraser.note2 His surviving siblings were Gladys, Edith, Eric, and Freda. He was a cousin of the Labour politician Grace Colman. In the subsequent years, the family moved to Ealing, first to 27 Inglis Road and then to 44 Inglis Road, a corner house at the end of the street. In 1911 and 1914, the family is recorded at 27 Denbigh Road.
Colman attended Hadleigh House School in Littlehampton where he discovered that he enjoyed acting despite his shyness. Later, Colman was educated at Rolandseck School in Ealing under German-born headmaster Ernst Felix Marx. note3 He intended to study engineering at Cambridge, but his father's sudden death from pneumonia in 1907 made it financially impossible.
While working as a clerk with Watts, Watts & Co., Ltd. (managers of the Britain Steamship Company) in the City of London, Colman joined the London Scottish Regiment in 1909 for four years. At the outbreak of the First World War, he quit his job the next day and rejoined his regiment. Colman was Private No. 2148 with the 1/14th (County of London) Battalion of the London Regiment (London Scottish).
On 15 September 1914, the battalion embarked at Southampton in the SS Winifred and arrived the next day at Le Havre. Six weeks later, the London Scottish were driven to Ypres to reinforce the front. At Ypres on 30 October, Colman was said to have "had the decidedly unpleasant experience of being buried alive by the explosion of a shell", but was dug out unharmed. Later that day, the battalion was moved to Wytschaete, where it engaged in the Battle of Messines on the next day. Colman was seriously wounded in the right ankle, which gave him a limp that he sought to hide throughout his acting career: "Disability. Fracture of Ankle (Rt.) In action near Ypres 31-10-14. Man states that when advancing a shell burst near him, and he was thrown heavily injuring his right foot either by the fall or his foot being struck. There is considerable thickening of Rt. ankle. There is also some tenderness and after walking any distance there is pain and lameness." Colman was treated at the field ambulance and was transferred to England the next day. He was admitted to St. Bartholomew's Hospital in London, where he stayed from 6 to 11 November. Having sufficiently recovered, Colman was transferred to the 3/14 Battalion of the London Scottish and was sent to Perth, where he did light clerical duty and lived at Strathview (No. 75–77), Muirton Place. On 6 May 1915, Colman was declared "No longer fit physically for war service" and discharged.
Colman's military character was given as "Very good. Honest, sober and trustworthy." He was awarded a pension, as well as the Victory Medal, the British War Medal, the 1914 Star with clasps and roses, and the Silver War Badge. In 1928, Colman was made an honorary life member of the London Scottish.
Fellow Hollywood actors Claude Rains, Herbert Marshall, Cedric Hardwicke, and Basil Rathbone all saw service with the London Scottish in the war.
Concert parties and amateur stage
About the same time Colman joined the London Scottish, he took to the stage and soon established himself as a member of the performing community in Ealing. Between 1909 and 1914, Colman appeared solo and with various concert parties and amateur dramatics groups. He began with banjo solos at benefit concerts and two years later, joined the short-lived Pierrot troupes The Tangerines and The Summer 'Uns, who only had one performance. In 1912, while on the Isle of Wight, Colman and some friends formed the Mad Medicos, who performed under his direction. A part of this troupe then became the Popinjays, again under Colman's direction, until George Denby (1892-1951) took over. Besides banjo solos and duets, Colman's repertoire included songs and duets such as "Two Little Sausages" (Lionel Monckton) and musical monologues, recitals of poems such as The Green Eye of the Little Yellow God, funny stories, and above all, character sketches from Dickens such as Uriah Heep, John Brodie, and Martin Chuzzlewit. At "An Evening with Dickens", Colman played Charles Darnay in three scenes from A Tale of Two Cities. He also staged three pieces of his own: the duologues "My Pierrot" and "A Knotty Problem" and the miniature revue "Come Inside". When Colman rejoined the Popinjays in July 1916 for performances at the Pavilion in Derby, between theatre engagements, a marked change in his repertoire occurred; the character sketch was now of a Chelsea Pensioner, and he recited Spotty, a Tale of the Trenches.
Besides these performances, Colman also appeared on the amateur stage. He made his debut as Freddy Fitzfoodle in Rich Miss Rustle at Victoria Hall, Ealing, on 11 November 1909. In April 1910, he sang in the chorus of palace officials and guards in the comic opera The Rose of Persia, performed by the Baltic Amateur Dramatic and Operatic Society at the Royal Court Theatre. Shortly afterwards he appeared in the one-act plays Barbara and Lights Out and Spoiling the Broth. In October and November of the same year, Colman sang and danced as Bill Bobstay in H.M.S. Pinafore with the West Middlesex Operatic Society. In 1911, he appeared in the farcical comedy Jane and in the next year as Samson Quayle in A Tight Corner. Around this time, Colman joined the Bancroft Dramatic Club, which had been founded in 1892 by Sir Squire Bancroft and performed mainly at the King's Hall Theatre on the premises of the National Sporting Club in Covent Garden. Among its vice presidents were actors such as George Alexander, Johnston Forbes-Robertson, and Ellen Terry. With the Bancroft D. C., Colman appeared in six plays between 1911 and 1914: The Admirable Crichton, Priscilla Runs Away, The Dancing Girl, The Passing of the Third Floor Back, Fanny's First Play, and Sowing the Wind. He also performed in Mr. Steinman's Corner and as Douglas Cattermole in The Private Secretary with Vivian Parrott's Amateur Dramatic Society.
Colman had sufficiently recovered from his wartime injury to appear at the London Coliseum on 19 June 1916 as Rahmat Sheikh in The Maharani of Arakan, with Lena Ashwell, at the Playhouse in September that year as Stephen Weatherbee in the Charles Goddard/Paul Dickey play The Misleading Lady, and at the Court Theatre in March 1917 as Webber in Partnership. At the same theatre, the following year he appeared in Eugène Brieux's Damaged Goods. At the Ambassadors Theatre in February 1918, Colman played George Lubin in The Little Brother. In 1918, he toured the UK as David Goldsmith in The Bubble and as Wilfred Carpenter in The Live Wire.
By 1914, the Colmans had moved to a furnished flat at 46 Lancaster Gate, Kensington. Colman now took rooms at 22 Adam Street, Portman Square, which he kept until after his marriage to Thelma Raye on the 18th of September 1920. They also had a flat in Victoria Street.