Actors, Politicians, and Celebrities

Discussion in 'General' started by morse1001, Mar 24, 2006.

  1. Herakles

    Herakles Senior Member

    Thankfully in WW2, quite a few artistic men like Niven were drafted into those services where their unique talents could be best used.

    So unlike what happened in WW1 when highly talented men were fodder for the guns.
     
  2. peterhastie

    peterhastie Senior Member

  3. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    Prince Philip.

    HMS Whelp en route to the Pacific. The First Lieutenant was Prince Philip of Greece who at that time was not yet engaged to HRH Princess Elizabeth although it was well known by everyone on board that mail arrived for Prince Philip from her


    BBC - WW2 People's War - Alongside Prince Philip
     
  4. Gage

    Gage The Battle of Barking Creek

  5. Cpl Rootes

    Cpl Rootes Senior Member

    Half of the cast of Dad's Army (Several in WW1 too)
     
  6. Za Rodinu

    Za Rodinu Hot air manufacturer

    Alec Guinness - Served in the Royal Navy throughout World War II, serving first as a seaman in 1941 and being commissioned the following year. While in the Navy, Guinness for a while planned on becoming an Anglican priest. He commanded a landing craft taking part in the invasion of Sicily and Elba and later ferried supplies to the Yugoslav partisans.

    Just saw this on Strategypage:

    Obi Wan Kenobi Goes to War
    Already an establish actor on the British stage, in 1941, Alec Guinness (1914-2000), was accepted as an officer candidate in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve. By his own account, Guinness says this was apparently solely on the basis of the fact that he could swim, since otherwise the interviewing petty officer made repeated “little disparaging shakes of the head” to virtually every answer he gave during his pre-induction interview. During his physical, however, the examining officer was greatly impressed with Guinness’ ability to expand his chest by four inches, the result of years of voice training.
    As did all officer candidates, Guinness – who served using his full name, Alec Guinness Cuffe – was initially enrolled as an ordinary seaman in HMS Raleigh, a shore-side basic training establishment near Plymouth, and then proceeded to other bases for more advanced training, at each step going through additional screenings, in which he was helped by the advice from a fellow actor who was already an officer, “just act the part.”
    After more schooling, and some practical experience, Guinness was commissioned a temporary sub-lieutenant in 1942, by which time he was training as a landing craft commander. Completing the course, Guinness was assigned to command an LCI(L) – landing craft, infantry (large). As his vessel was actually under construction in Boston, he sailed for America aboard the Queen Mary. Arriving in the U.S., Guinness was not displeased to learn that HMS LCI(L)-124 would not be ready for some time. Pulling in a few favors, he was able to secure a role in the American premier of the play Flare Path, which opened at the Henry Miller Theatre on Broadway on December 23, 1942.
    In Flare Path, about the lives of R.A.F. officers and their wives and sweethearts, Guinness played a young flight lieutenant. The New York Times review called the play “slow and sentimental,” but observed that this impression might be due to the fact that the reviewer – like most Americans – had never been bombed. The reviewer went on to say that Guinness, in his American debut, brought “nervous energy and bounce to the part,” but was not always convincing. Essentially a puff piece written with the support of Bomber Command, the play closed in early January, after only 14 performances.
    Guinness was shortly at sea in command of LCI(L)-124, and was promoted to temporary lieutenant in April of 1943. He first saw action during the landings in Sicily (July 9, 1943), in the course of which LCI(L)-124 was fouled by another vessel and remained stuck on the beach for more than a week. Guinness and his crew – all 17 of them – later supported Allied operations in Italy, helped land the French on Elba (June 17, 1944), and then ran supplies to the Yugoslav Partisans until the vessel was wrecked in a storm off the Italian port of Termoli in early 1945. Guinness held various assignments thereafter until he was released from the service shortly after the end of the war.
    Guinness later claimed that his training as an actor helped him be a better officer, since so much of what an officer does is acting. And apparently his experiences as an officer helped him become a better actor, for he admitted to modelling officers that he was asked to play in the course of his acting career on men whom he had known while in the service.
    Guinness’ experience as an officer in the Royal Navy, and that of many other later notable Britons, such as Nicholas Monsarrat, Evelyn Waugh, and James Callaghan, is examined in Brian Lavery’s In Which They Served: The Royal Navy Officer Experience in the Second World Warhttp://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=thehundredyearsw&l=as2&o=1&a=1591144019 (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2008)


    Where would we be without the Search function? :)
     
    Juha likes this.
  7. James Daly

    James Daly Senior Member

    there was an interesting article in the January 2009 Issue of Britain at War Magazine, about the war service of the Dads Army actors. Turns out that Arnold Ridley, who played Godfrey, saw more action than any of them! quite an interesting story, I will have to dig it out...
     
  8. urqh

    urqh Senior Member

    there was only one that really mattered surely..Spike.
     
  9. Rob Dickers

    Rob Dickers 10th MEDIUM REGT RA

    Favourite Arty Celebs

    Spike Milligan - 56 Heavy Regt Royal Artillery
    Harry Secombe - 132 Field Regt Royal Artillery
    Frankie Howerd - Royal Artillery
    Sir John Mills - 2nd Lt Royal Artillery
    Sir Edward Heath Lt Col Royal Artillery

    Apologies to the Red-Caps
    21 days in the Glasshouse!

    Rob
     
  10. Gerard

    Gerard Seelow/Prora

    James Stewart served as a bomber pilot with USAAF, flying missions over France and Germany.

    Douglas Fairbanks Jr also served in the US airforce.
     
  11. Za Rodinu

    Za Rodinu Hot air manufacturer

    George Bush, pilot USNavy, President USA.
     
  12. urqh

    urqh Senior Member

    which one
     
  13. cash_13

    cash_13 Senior Member

    I thought this thread would be really good as everyone searched their brains and tried to remember what actors served.....

    Then people come along and cut and paste the whole bloody lot that ended that topic
     
  14. urqh

    urqh Senior Member

    ahhh..see...where you went wrong was to not just say who was your favourite...spike and niven for me..im pretty sure thora hird was ats too..so shes my female of the species.
     
  15. Za Rodinu

    Za Rodinu Hot air manufacturer

    Ahh, sorry, I did go off track with a Celebrity who wasn't an actor, insofar as one might be allowed to think that politicians have to be actors...

    I'll mend my ways and suggest Ronald Reagan, an actor who didn't quite make it as, even being an officer in Army Reserve since 1935, he wasn't accepted for combat duty due to astigmatism :)

    Urqh, that was GB senior who flew a Grumman Avenger in the Pacific, junior got into the National Guard as a fighter pilot, and some people will say he avoided going to Vietnam, although this may be disputed.
     
  16. izzy

    izzy Senior Member

    Denholm Elliot was i believe a P.O.W
     
  17. tmac

    tmac Senior Member

    Captain Richard Todd parachuted into Normandy with 6th Airborne Division in the early hours of D-Day as part of the operation to secure the area around the Caen Canal bridge and the Orne River bridge (now known as Pegasus Bridge and Horsa Bridge). The bridges had earlier been captured by the famous glider-borne Ox and Bucks Light Infantry force led by Major John Howard. In 1962, Todd played Major Howard in the film The Longest Day.
     
  18. Bernhart

    Bernhart Member

    James Doohan (scotty from star trek) was in Canadian army wounded on D-day, afterwards flew light planes spotting artillery
     
  19. Za Rodinu

    Za Rodinu Hot air manufacturer

    Stars in the skies :)

    For example:

    James Stewart (May 20, 1908-July 2, 1997). Film actor; personal aircraft: Cessna 310; partnered in P-51B Bendix/Thompson racer. Academy Award (1940); AFI Lifetime Achievement Award (1980). Joined USAAC in 1940, was initially refused entry because he was 5 pounds under the required 148 pounds, but he talked the recruitment officer into ignoring the test. Eventually became a Colonel, 8th AF Sqn Cmdr 703 BS 445 BG, and Ops Officer 453 BG (&rt;456 BG), awarded Air Medal, Distinguished Flying Cross, Croix de Guerre, and 7 battle stars. Flew B-17 and B-24 in WW2, B-52 and B-58 in Vietnam; combat crew rated in B-36. In 1959, while in USAFR, he was promoted to BrigGenl, the highest ranking actor in military history (but would not permit his war record to be used in movies or as publicity). Trivia: SSgt Walter Matthau (not an actor at the time) served under him as a B-24 crewman and radio cryptographer. Aviation films: Airport '77 (1977); Flight of the Phoenix, The (1965); No Highway in the Sky (1951); Spirit of St Louis, The (1957); Strategic Air Command (1955).

    Henry Fonda (5/16/05-8/12/82), USN Ltjg, Air Combat Intelligence, Pacific theater; awarded Bronze Star. Hobby was making model airplanes and kites, often in league with lifelong pal James Stewart.
    [​IMG]
    Glenn Ford (Gwyllyn Ford), USCG, was in Battle of Midway
    [​IMG]
    John Ford (John Martin Feeney) (2/1/94-8/31/73) (d), USN Cdr, USNR RAdm; Purple Heart for wounds while filming "The Battle of Midway"

    Clark Gable (William Clark Gable) (2/1/01-11/16/60), USAAF gunner/observer 8th AF: 91 BG, 303 BG, 351 BS, 359 BG. Also directed AAF film unit in England, rose to rank of Major. Hermann Göring offered Luftwaffe pilots a $5000 reward for his capture, dead or alive. (That had been companioned by a tale that Hilter admired him, offered a reward for his capture alive.).

    Paul Newman (1/26/25), USN, TBM radioman-gunner
    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]
    Jack Palance (Walter Palanyuk), USAAF, B-24 pilot; Purple Heart, scars from burns and facial reconstruction after bailing out of his burning plane (1942)
    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]
    Donald Pleasance (10/5/19-2/2/95), RAF bomber crewman, shot down and captured, interned until 1945 at Stalag Luft 1, where he organized a theater company.

    Etc, etc, etc. :)
     
  20. Smudger Jnr

    Smudger Jnr Our Man in Berlin

    Miguel,

    That is a long and interesting list.

    Regards
    Tom
     

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