Brian Donlevy Collection

Brian Donlevy
(1901 – 1972)

In The Great McGinty (1940), Muriel Angelus as Catherine McGinty delivers the line "... you're a tough guy, McGinty, not a wrong guy." The line seems to sum up all of her co star, Brian Donlevy's roles. Brian Donlevy was a natural to cast as the "heavy", but even at his most despicable, he manages to bring something to the character that we can find to sympathize with and even admire.

In real life, Donlevy certainly certainly had tough-guy credibility. Brian Donlevy was born the son of a whiskey distiller in County Armagh, Ireland, in 1901. When baby Brian was just ten months old, the family emigrated to America, where father Thomas Donlevy became the manager of a woolen mill in Sheboygan Falls, Wisconsin. When the local National Guard unit was called up to join General Pershing to chase Pancho Villa, and young Brian ran away from home, lied about his age (he was 14) and joined the expedition as a bugler.

He remained on active duty and was shipped to France with Company C, 127th Infantry Regiment of the 32nd Infantry Division. A WWI infantryman was not enough adventure, so he managed a transfer to receive pilot training and became an honorary member of the Lafayette Flying Corps (not an actual unit, like the Lafayette Escadrille). Donlevy was injured twice while flying in France, and after the War won an appointment to the US Naval Academy. While training to become "an officer and a gentleman", Donlevy began participating in dramatic productions, and developed a love of acting which changed the course of his life.

Donlevy began his dramatic career in New York, appearing on stage, in silent films and modeling for Arrow Collar advertisements. In 1926, he made the move to Hollywood where he began in small roles in a variety of films. His "big break" was as a henchman in Edward G. Robinson's Barbary Coast (1935). In 1939 he played the main bad guy in Destry Rides Again, James Stewart's first Western, and the sadistic Sergeant Markoff in Beau Geste.

His portrayal of the Foreign Legion Sergeant got Donlevy an Academy Award Nomination for Best Supporting Actor. It also gave him a lifelong scar. During a climactic scene, Ray Milland stabs the bad guy with his bayonet, but while filming Milland missed the protective padding Donlevy was wearing, cutting into his lower left ribcage (not his shoulder as commonly reported).

Throughout his film career, Donlevy appeared on Radio in support of his films on movie anthology programs like Lux Hollywood Theater and The Lady Esther Screen Guild Theatre. He was as comfortable in front of the microphone as he was the camera, and he also appeared on The George Burns/Gracie Allen Show and in patriotic stories on DuPont's Cavalcade of America. In 1949, Donlevy created the role of Steve Mitchell for Dangerous Assignment for NBC radio. Although the show shared the lineup with The Man Called X, Donlevy's show never enjoyed the same network support, although it did have acceptable Hooper numbers. Donlevy's production company brought the show to TV in 1952 for a single season.

Donlevy continued to appear in films and was a guest star on many television series, including Rawhide, Crossroads and Wagon Train. When he was not working, Donlevy's twin passions were writing poetry and gold mining.

A Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1551 Vine St honors Brian Donlevy's contributions to Television.