Errol Flynn

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Errol_Flynn

an error of name - William G. Smith - the "right" brothers

Errol Leslie Thomson Flynn (20 June 1909 – 14 October 1959) was an Australian-born American actor during the Golden Age of Hollywood. Considered the natural successor to Douglas Fairbanks, he achieved worldwide fame for his romantic swashbuckler roles in Hollywood films, as well as frequent partnerships with Olivia de Havilland. He was best known for his role as Robin Hood in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938); his portrayal of the character was named by the American Film Institute as the 18th greatest hero in American film history. His other famous roles included the eponymous lead in Captain Blood (1935), Major Geoffrey Vickers in The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936), as well as a number of Westerns, such as Dodge City (1939), Santa Fe Trail (1940), and San Antonio (1945).

He was an Australian-American film actor, known for his romantic swashbuckler roles in Hollywood films and his flamboyant lifestyle.

Errol Flynn was born in Hobart, Tasmania, where his father, Theodore Thomson Flynn, was a lecturer (1909) and later professor (1911) of biology at the University of Tasmania (UTAS). His mother was born Lily Mary Young, but dropped the first names Lily Mary shortly after she was married and changed her name to Marelle.Flynn described his mother's family as "seafaring folk" and this appears to be where his life-long interest in boats and the sea originated. Despite Flynn's claims, the evidence indicates that he was not descended from any of the Bounty mutineers.Married at St John's Church of England, Balmain North, Sydney, on 23 January 1909, both of his parents were native-born Australians of Irish, English and Scottish descent, with convict links to Tasmania long before Flynn's birth. Flynn, living at Mclean Ave Chatswood, Sydney, New South Wales in 1926, attended Sydney Church of England Grammar School (Shore School) where he was the classmate of future Australian Prime Minister, John Gorton.He was expelled for fighting and, allegedly, having sex with a school laundress.He was also expelled from several other schools he had attended in Tasmania. At the age of 20 he moved to New Guinea where he bought a tobacco plantation, a business which failed. A copper mining venture in the hills near the Laloki Valley, behind the present national capital, Port Moresby, also failed.

In the early 1930s, Flynn left for the United Kingdom and, in 1933, snagged an acting job with the Northampton repertory company at the town's Royal Theatre, where he worked for seven months. He also performed at the 1934 Malvern Festival and in Glasgow and London's West End.

In 1933, he starred in the Australian film In the Wake of the Bounty, directed by Charles Chauvel, and in 1934 appeared in Murder at Monte Carlo, produced at the Warner Bros. Teddington Studios, UK. This latter film is now considered a lost film. During the filming of Murder at Monte Carlo, Flynn was discovered by a Warner Brothers executive, signed to a contract and immigrated to America as a contract actor. In 1942, Flynn became a naturalised citizen of the United States.

Marriages and Family:

Flynn was married three times: to actress Lili Damita from 1935 until 1942 (one son, Sean Flynn, born 1941, reported missing in Cambodia in 1970 and presumed dead); to Nora Eddington from 1943 until 1949 (two daughters, Deirdre born 1945 and Rory born 1947); and to actress Patrice Wymore from 1950 until his death (one daughter, Arnella Roma, 1953-1998). In Hollywood he tended to refer to himself as Irish rather than Australian (his father Theodore Thomson Flynn had been a biologist and a professor at the Queen's University of Belfast in Northern Ireland during the latter part of his career). Flynn lived with Wymore in Port Antonio, Jamaica in the 1950s. He was largely responsible for developing tourism to this area, and for a while owned the Titchfield Hotel which was decorated by the artist Olga Lehmann. He also popularised trips down rivers on bamboo rafts.

In the late 1950s Flynn met and courted the 15-year-old Beverly Aadland at the Hollywood Professional School, casting her in his final film, Cuban Rebel Girls (1959). According to Aadland, he planned to marry her and move to their new house in Jamaica, but during a trip together to Vancouver, British Columbia, he died of a heart attack at the age of 50.

His only son, Sean, an actor and later a noted war correspondent, disappeared in Cambodia in 1970 during the Vietnam War while working as a freelance photojournalist for Time magazine; he was presumed dead in 1971, probably murdered by the Khmer Rouge. Flynn was officially declared dead in 1984, in a granted petition of declaration sought by his mother, Lili Damita. Remains thought to be Sean's were handed over to US officials in Phnom Penh on 26 March 2010. Sean's life was recounted in Inherited Risk by Jeffrey Meyers (Simon & Schuster) and he is also mentioned on page 194 in the Colleagues section of Dispatches by Michael Herr. Flynn's daughter Rory has one son, Sean Rio Flynn, named after her half-brother. He is an actor.Rory Flynn has written a book about her father entitled The Baron of Mulholland--A Daughter Remembers Errol Flynn.

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Errol_Flynn

Filmography: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Errol_Flynn_filmography

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001224/

Find a Grave: http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=349