Hurd Hatfield

William Rukard Hurd Hatfield was an American actor best known for often playing characters of handsome narcissistic young men most notably Dorian Gray in the film The Picture of Dorian Gray Hatfield was born in New York City to William Henry Hatfield who died in 1954 an attorney who served as deputy attorney general for New York and his wife Adele née McGuire Hurd was educated at Columbia University then moved to London England where he studied drama and began acting in theatre He returned to America for his film debut in Dragon Seed in which he and his costars Katharine Hepburn Akim Tamiroff Aline MacMahon Turhan Bey portrayed Chinese peasants some more convincingly than others Hatfields second film The Picture of Dorian Gray made him a star As Oscar Wildes ageless antihero Hatfield received widespread acclaim for his dark good looks as much as for his acting ability However the actor was ambivalent about the role and his performance The film didnt make me popular in Hollywood he commented later It was too odd too avantgarde too ahead of its time The decadence the hints of bisexuality and so on made me a leper Nobody knew I had a sense of humor and people wouldnt even have lunch with me His followup films The Diary of a Chambermaid The Beginning or the End and The Unsuspected were successful but Joan of Arc was a critical and financial failure Hatfields film career began to lose momentum very quickly in the 1950s and he returned to the stage Subsequent movies included supporting roles in The Left Handed Gun King of Kings as Pontius Pilate El Cid Harlow as Paul Bern and The Boston Strangler He cut back on performing in the 1970s His later movies included King David and Her Alibi He appeared frequently on television and received an Emmy Award nomination for the Hallmark Hall of Fame videotaped play The Invincible Mr Disraeli In 1957 he appeared in Beyond This Place directed by Sidney Lumet Other television credits include three guest appearances on Murder She Wrote opposite his Picture of Dorian Gray costar Angela Lansbury who had become a lifelong friend He also appeared as the villain in the second episode of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea He appeared in Alfred Hitchcock Presents in None Are So Blind In 1952 Hatfield appeared as Joseph in Westinghouse Studio Ones The Nativity This was a rare commercial network staging of a 14thcentury mystery play adapted from the York and Chester plays According to the magazine Films in Review Hatfield was ambivalent about having played Dorian Gray feeling that it had typecast him You know I was never a great beauty in Grayand I never understood why I got the part and have spent my career regretting it he is reported to have said He died in his sleep of a heart attack at a friends home aged 81 after celebrating Christmas dinner Description above from the Wikipedia article Hurd Hatfield licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia