Anthony Perkins

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For other people named Anthony Perkins, see Anthony Perkins (disambiguation).
Anthony Perkins
Anthony Perkins.jpg
Anthony Perkins in 1975, by Allan Warren
BornApril 4, 1932
New York City, New York, U.S.
DiedSeptember 12, 1992(aged 60)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Cause of deathAIDS-related pneumonia
NationalityAmerican
Occupation
  • Actor
  • singer
Years active1953–1992
Spouse(s)Berry Berenson
(m. 1973)
ChildrenOz Perkins
Elvis Perkins
Parent(s)Osgood Perkins
(father)
Anthony Perkins (April 4, 1932 – September 12, 1992) was an American actor and singer.
He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his second film, Friendly Persuasion, but is best known for playing Norman Bates in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) and its three sequels.
His other films include Fear Strikes Out (1957), The Matchmaker (1958), On the Beach (1959), Tall Story (1960), The Trial (1962), Phaedra (1962), Five Miles to Midnight (1962), Pretty Poison (1968), Murder on the Orient Express (1974), Mahogany (1975), North Sea Hijack (1979), The Black Hole (1979), and Crimes of Passion (1984).

Early life[edit]

Perkins was born in New York City, son of stage and film actor Osgood Perkins and his wife, Janet Esselstyn (née Rane). His paternal great-grandfather was wood engraver Andrew Varick Stout Anthony.[1] He was five when his father died.[2]
Perkins was a descendant of a Mayflower passenger, John Howland. He attended Brooks School, Browne & Nichols School, Columbia University and Rollins College, having moved to Boston in 1942.[3]

Career[edit]

Perkins made his film debut in The Actress (1953). The film was a commercial disappointment.
Perkins was first really noticed when he replaced John Kerr on Broadway in the lead of Tea and Sympathy in 1954. This renewed Hollywood interest in him.[4]

Stardom[edit]

Perkins received a lot of attention for his second film, Friendly Persuasion (1956), playing the son of Gary Cooper under the direction of William Wyler. The film was very successful and Perkins received the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year – Actor and an Academy Award nomination.
He followed it as the troubled former Boston Red Sox baseball player Jimmy Piersall in the 1957 biopic Fear Strikes Out (1957).
Perkins then made two Westerns: The Lonely Man (1957) with Jack Palance and The Tin Star (1957) with Henry Fonda.
He released three pop music albums and several singles in 1957 and 1958 on Epic and RCA Victor as "Tony Perkins".[5] His single "Moon-Light Swim" was a moderate hit in the United States, peaking at number 24 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1957.[5] He showcased his musical talents in The Matchmaker (1958) with Shirley Booth and Shirley MacLaine.
A life member of the Actors Studio,[6] Perkins also acted in theater. In 1958, he was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his performance in Look Homeward, Angel (1957–59) on Broadway. He played the role of Eugene Gant.[citation needed]
In film, he appeared in This Angry Age (1958) for Columbia and Desire Under the Elms (1958) for Paramount, lusting after Sophia Loren. He was more happily cast in The Matchmaker (1958).
Perkins was Audrey Hepburn's love interest in Green Mansions (1959), one of Hepburn's few flops. He was a doomed lover in On the Beach (1959) and played a college basketball champion in Tall Story (1960), best remembered for being Jane Fonda's film debut.
On Broadway, he starred in the Frank Loesser musical Greenwillow (1960), for which he was nominated for another Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical.

Psycho[edit]

Perkins in youth had a boyish, earnest quality, reminiscent of the young James Stewart, which Alfred Hitchcock exploited and subverted when the actor starred as Norman Bates in the 1960 film Psycho.[7] The film was a critical and commercial success, and gained Perkins international fame for his performance as the homicidal owner of the Bates Motel. Perkins' performance gained him the Best Actor Award from the International Board of Motion Picture Reviewers. The role and its multiple sequels affected the remainder of his career.[8]

Europe[edit]

In 1961, Perkins received considerable critical acclaim for his performance in the film Goodbye Again, shot in Paris opposite Ingrid Bergman, a performance which won him the Best Actor Award at the 1961 Cannes Film Festival. The film was a notable success in France but not the US.
With Charmian Carr in Evening Primrose, 1966
He appeared in a short-lived Broadway play Harold (1962) then made a series of films in Europe: Phaedra (1962), shot in Greece with Melina Mercouri and directed by Jules Dassin; Five Miles to Midnight (1962) with Sophia Loren; Orson Welles' 1962 adaptation of Kafka's The Trial (1962), shot in Yugoslavia; Le glaive et la balance (1963), shot in France; Une ravissante idiote (1964) with Brigitte Bardot.
He made a film in Mexico, The Fool Killer (1965), then returned to France to make a cameo in Is Paris Burning? (1966).

Return to the US[edit]

For American television, he appeared in Evening Primrose (1966). He then went to Broadway to appear in a play by Neil Simon, The Star Spangled Girl (1966–67).
Perkins starred in another French film, The Champagne Murders (1967) for Claude Chabrol, then made his first Hollywood movie since Psycho, Pretty Poison (1968) with Tuesday Weld. The film was not a box office success but has become a notable cult favorite.[9]

Supporting actor[edit]

Perkins moved into supporting roles in Hollywood-feature films, playing Chaplain Tappman in Catch-22 (1970) and appearing in WUSA(1970). Off Broadway, he appeared in and directed Steambath (1970).
He had the lead in a TV movie, How Awful About Allan (1970) and supported Charles Bronson in the French movie, Someone Behind the Door (1971). He starred in Chabrol's Ten Days' Wonder (1971).
Perkins was reunited with Weld when he supported her in Play It as It Lays (1972). He was also in The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972).
Perkins co-wrote, with composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim, the screenplay for the 1973 film The Last of Sheila, for which they received a 1974 Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for Best Motion Picture Screenplay.
Perkins was one of the many stars featured in the 1974 hit Murder on the Orient Express. He co-starred with Beau Bridges in Lovin' Molly (1974).[10] He enjoyed success on Broadway in Peter Shaffer's 1974 play Equus (where he was a replacement in the leading role originally played by Anthony Hopkins).[11] Off Broadway he directed The Wager(1974).
Perkins supported Diana Ross in Mahogany (1975) and hosted television's Saturday Night Live in 1976.
He co-starred with Geraldine Chaplin in Remember My Name (1978) and had some good roles on TV, playing Mary Tyler Moore's husband in First, You Cry (1978) and as Javert in Les Misérables (1978). He was featured in Walt Disney's The Black Hole, in 1979. He had another Broadway success with Bernard Slade's 1979 play Romantic Comedy, which ran for 396 performances.[citation needed]
Perkins was a villain in North Sea Hijack (1980)[12] and one of many names in Winter Kills (1980). He also starred in the 1980 Canadian film Deadly Companion (also known as Double Negative).[13]

Psycho sequels[edit]

Perkins in 1983
Perkins reprised the role of Norman Bates in Psycho's three sequels. The first, Psycho II (1983), was a box-office success twenty-three years after the original film. He went to Australia to appear in For the Term of His Natural Life (1983).
After The Glory Boys (1984) for British television, Perkins made Crimes of Passion (1984) for Ken Russell.[14]
He then starred in and directed Psycho III (for which he was nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Actor) in 1986.
Perkins had supporting roles in Napoleon and Josephine: A Love Story (1987), and Destroyer (1988). He directed but did not appear in Lucky Stiff (1988).
Perkins starred in some additional horror films, Edge of Sanity (1989), Daughter of Darkness (1990), and I'm Dangerous Tonight(1990). He played Norman Bates again in the made-for-cable film Psycho IV: The Beginning in 1990, over which he had much creative control, although he was turned down for director.
Perkins has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, an honor he received for his influential and exceptional contributions to the motion–picture industry. It is located at 6801 Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles.
In 1991, Perkins was honored with the Donostia Lifetime Achievement Award at the San Sebastián International Film Festival.
Although he was fighting AIDS, he appeared in eight television productions between 1990 and 1992, including Daughter of Darkness(1990) and The Naked Target (1992). He made his final appearance in In the Deep Woods (1992) with Rosanna Arquette. He had agreed to provide the voice for the role of the dentist, Dr. Wolfe, in The Simpsons episode "Last Exit to Springfield" but died before the part could be recorded. In the end, the character was voiced by Simpsons regular Hank Azaria.[15]
Perkins was portrayed by British actor James D'Arcy in the 2012 biographical drama Hitchcock, which starred Anthony Hopkins as Alfred Hitchcock and Helen Mirren as Alma Reville.

Personal life[edit]

Perkins was an extremely shy person, especially in the company of women.[16] According to the posthumous biography Split Image by Charles Winecoff, he had exclusively same-sex relationships until his late 30s, including with actors Rock Hudson and Tab Hunter; artist Christopher Makos; dancer Rudolf Nureyev; composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim; and dancer-choreographer Grover Dale.[17] Perkins has been described as one of the two great men in the life of French songwriter Patrick Loiseau.[18]
Perkins reportedly had his first heterosexual experience at age 39 with actress Victoria Principal[19][20] on location filming The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean in 1971.[16]He met photographer Berinthia "Berry" Berenson, the younger sister of actress and model Marisa Berenson, at a party in New York City in 1972.[16] They married when he was aged 41 and she was 25, on August 9, 1973 and had two sons: actor Oz Perkins (b. February 2, 1974), and musician Elvis Perkins (b. February 9, 1976).[21]

Death[edit]

Diagnosed with HIV during the filming of Psycho IV: The Beginning, Perkins died at his Los Angeles home on September 12, 1992, from AIDS-related[22][23][24] pneumonia at age 60.[25] His urn, inscribed "Don’t Fence Me In," is in an altar by a bench on the terrace of his former home in the Hollywood Hills.[26] His widow died nine years later on American Airlines Flight 11 in the September 11 attacks.[21]

Filmography[edit]

Film/TV
YearTitleRoleNotes
1953The ActressFred Whitmarsh
1956Friendly PersuasionJosh BirdwellGolden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer
Nominated – Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor
1957Fear Strikes OutJim Piersall
1957The Lonely ManRiley Wade
1957The Tin StarSheriff Ben Owens
1958This Angry AgeJoseph DufresneAlternate title: The Sea Wall
1958Desire Under the ElmsEben Cabot
1958The MatchmakerCornelius Hackl
1959Green MansionsAbel
1959On the BeachLt. Peter Holmes – Royal Australian Navy
1960Tall StoryRay Blent
1960PsychoNorman BatesBest Actor International board of motion picture reviewers
1961Goodbye AgainPhilip Van der BeshCannes Film Festival Award for Best Actor
1962PhaedraAlexis
1962Five Miles to MidnightRobert MacklinFrench title: Le couteau dans la plaie
1962The TrialJosef K
1963Le glaive et la balanceJohnny ParsonsEnglish title: The Sword and the Balance
1964Une ravissante idioteHarry Compton / Nicholas MaukoulineEnglish title: The Ravishing Idiot
1965The Fool KillerMilo Bogardus
1966Is Paris Burning?Sgt. WarrenOriginal French title: Paris brûle-t-il ?
1966Evening PrimroseCharles SnellTV movie
1967The Champagne MurdersChristopherOriginal French title: Le Scandale
1968Pretty PoisonDennis Pitt
1970Catch-22Chaplain Capt. A. T. TappmanNominated – National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actor
1970WUSARaineyNominated – National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actor
1970How Awful About AllanAllanTV movie
1971Someone Behind the DoorLaurence JeffriesOriginal French title: Quelqu'un derrière la porte
1971Ten Days' WonderCharles Van HornOriginal French title: La Décade prodigieuse
1972Play It as It LaysB.Z. Mendenhall
1972The Life and Times of Judge Roy BeanReverend LaSalle
1974Lovin' MollyGid
1974Murder on the Orient ExpressHector McQueen
1975MahoganySean McAvoy
1978Remember My NameNeil Curry
1978First, You CryArthur HerozTV movie
1978Les MisérablesJavertTV movie
1979North Sea HijackLou KramerAlternate titles: Ffolkes and Assault Force
1979Winter KillsJohn Cerruti
1979Twice a WomanAlfred Boeken
1979The Black HoleDr. Alex Durant
1980Deadly CompanionLawrence MilesAlternate title: Double Negative
1983For the Term of His Natural LifeRev James NorthTV miniseries
1983The Sins of Dorian GrayHenry LordTV movie
1983Psycho IINorman Bates
1984The Glory BoysJimmyTV miniseries
1984Crimes of PassionRev. Peter Shayne
1986Psycho IIINorman BatesAlso director
Nominated – Saturn Award for Best Actor
1987Napoleon and Josephine: A Love StoryTalleyrandTV miniseries
1988DestroyerRobert EdwardsAlternate title: Shadow of Death
1988Lucky StiffN/ADirector
1989Edge of SanityDr. Henry Jekyll / Jack 'The Ripper' Hyde
1990Daughter of DarknessAnton / Prince ConstantineTV movie
1990Mistress of SuspenseHimself (Host)TV series (12 episodes)
1990I'm Dangerous TonightProf. BuchananTV movie
1990The Ghost WriterAnthony StrackTV pilot episode
1990Psycho IV: The BeginningNorman BatesTV movie
1991A Demon in My ViewArthur JohnsonOriginal title: Der Mann nebenan
1992The Naked TargetEl MecanoOriginal Spanish title: Los gusanos no llevan bufanda
1992In the Deep WoodsPaul Miller, P.I.TV movie, (final film role)

References[edit]

  1. Jump up^ "Architecture of 196 Beacon Street, Back Bay, Boston". BOSarchitecture. Archived from the original on May 8, 2014. Retrieved November 3, 2016.
  2. Jump up^ "OSGOOD PERKINS, STAGE STAR, DIES; Stricken After Premiere of 'Susan and God,' in Which He Was Leading Man". The New York Times. September 22, 1937. Retrieved April 1, 2008.(Subscription required.)
  3. Jump up^ "Anthony Perkins Biography". Yahoo! Movies. Archived from the original on February 14, 2007. Retrieved June 18, 2007.
  4. Jump up^ Myers, Steven Lee (1992-09-14). "Anthony Perkins, Star of 'Psycho' And All Its Sequels, Is Dead at 60". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-10-26.
  5. ^ Jump up to:a b "Tony Perkins". AllMusic. Retrieved January 9, 2008.
  6. Jump up^ Garfield, David (1980). "Appendix: Life Members of The Actors Studio as of January 1980". A Player's Place: The Story of The Actors Studio. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc. p. 279. ISBN 0-02-542650-8.
  7. Jump up^ "Norman Bates: A Most Terrifying Mama's Boy". NPR.org. Retrieved 2017-10-26.
  8. Jump up^ Weinraub, Bernard (1992-09-16). "Anthony Perkins's Wife Tells of 2 Years of Secrecy". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-10-26.
  9. Jump up^ A PERSONAL REVOLUTION: Anthony Perkins Trying to Mature Boyish Image ANTHONY PERKINS Thomas, Kevin. Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File) [Los Angeles, Calif] 20 Dec 1967: c1.
  10. Jump up^ "Anthony Perkins Movies | Ultimate Movie Rankings". www.ultimatemovierankings.com. Retrieved 2017-10-27.
  11. Jump up^ Barnes, Clive (1975-07-17). "Stage: Perkins in 'Equus'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-10-26.
  12. Jump up^ McLaglen, Andrew V. (1980-04-18), ffolkes, Roger Moore, James Mason, Anthony Perkins, retrieved 2017-10-26
  13. Jump up^ Bloomfield, George (1981-11-30), Double Negative, Michael Sarrazin, Susan Clark, Anthony Perkins, retrieved 2017-10-26
  14. Jump up^ "Biography for Anthony Perkins". Turner Classic Movies. Retrieved 2017-10-26.
  15. Jump up^ Jean, Al (2004). The Simpsons season 4 DVD commentary for the episode "Last Exit to Springfield" (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
  16. ^ Jump up to:a b c Darrach, Brad (June 13, 1983). "Return of Psycho". Vol. 19, No. 23. People. Retrieved January 3, 2009.
  17. Jump up^ Winecoff, Charles (1996). Split Image: The Life of Anthony Perkins. New York: Dutton. ISBN 0-525-94064-2.
  18. Jump up^ "La MST de Dave: son compagnon raconte…" (in French). Closer. May 2, 2012. Retrieved November 3, 2016.
  19. Jump up^ March 6, 1989. "Great Factoids". Vol. 19, No. 23. People. Archived from the original on September 20, 2015. Retrieved March 24, 2016.
  20. Jump up^ Kennedy, Dana (September 20, 1996). "Split Image: The Life of Anthony Perkins". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved February 5, 2017.
  21. ^ Jump up to:a b Hopkinson, Amanda (September 14, 2001). "Berry Berenson". The Guardian. Retrieved August 28, 2009.
  22. Jump up^ Goodman, Mark (September 28, 1992). "One Final Mystery". Vol. 38, No. 13. People. Retrieved August 22, 2013.
  23. Jump up^ Weinraub, Bernard (September 16, 1992). "Anthony Perkins's Wife Tells of 2 Years of Secrecy". The New York Times. Retrieved August 22, 2013.
  24. Jump up^ Ferrell, David (September 13, 1992). "Anthony Perkins, 60, Dies; Star of 'Psycho' Had AIDS". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved August 22, 2013.
  25. Jump up^ "Anthony Perkins". TV Guide. Retrieved August 22, 2013.
  26. Jump up^ Wilson, Scott. Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Locations 36782-36783). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition.

Further reading[edit]

  • Bergan, Ronald: Anthony Perkins: A Haunted Life. London: Little, Brown and Company, 1995; ISBN 0-316-90697-2.
  • Hilton, Johan: Monster i garderoben: En bok om Anthony Perkins och tiden som skapade Norm Bates. Stockholm: Natur & Kultur, 2015; ISBN 978-91-271-3430-0. (in Swedish)
  • Capua, Michelangelo "Anthony Perkins. Prigioniero della Paura." Torino, Lindau, 2003; ISBN 978-8867082759

External links[edit]