Edward G Robinson is one of those movie stars who will probably only have one biography written about them, so it’s lucky this is a pretty good one. His story should stand as an inspiration for short, ethnic, pudgy ugly actors – he started at a young age and took a while for his career to get going, but he worked hard and was versatile with plenty of energy, and soon he was in demand on stage. A couple of decent parts saw him become a Broadway star and he was heavily in demand by the studios even before Little Caesar.
In hindsight it’s not hard to see why – most oohing and aahing about stars concerns how good looking they are, but there’s always room for a “character actor” star, especially one who can convey gravitas eg Morgan Freeman, Wallace Beery, Judi Dench. You can cast them as gangsters, cops, royalty, etc – people for the spunk rats to bounce off. Little Caesar then gave Robinson the role of a lifetime – literally, he could sponge off that image for the rest of his life. Being intelligent and ambitions he didn’t want to; like most Warners stars he hankered after better roles and fought the front office to get them; sometimes he succeeded too (a cop in Confessions of a Nazi Spy, a nebbish in The Whole Town’s Talking, a scientist in Dr Ehlrich’s Magic Bullet).
Robinson suffered greatly during the blacklist. I was unaware of how much stick he came in for – I figured because he wasn’t officially put on the list or put in gaol it wasn’t too bad. Well, I was wrong – he was frequently bagged in the columns and dragged in front of HUAC several times. This despite never actually being a member of the Communist Party (he was a do-gooder and a soft touch). In that horrible way of the time to get out of it he had to go through this medieval-like purging ceremony, admitting he had been duped. He even named a few names. (I’m convinced HUAC went after him especially hard because they wanted to nab a famous actor on top of all these writers and directors they had; along with John Garfield he would have been the biggest star tarnished by McCarthyism).
Robinson’s career suffered a decade dip accordingly. His tenure as a top rank star probably would have faded anyway – he was lucky to have it as long as he did – but he missed out on a decade’s worth of juicy roles. Robinson’s ability and castability meant he got good parts up until the end of his life, apart from the greylist period. However, even during that he made some decent Bs (Hell on Frisco Bay, Illegal), and found Broadway stardom again in Chayefksy’s Middle of the Night.
Robinson seems to have been an admirable person in many ways: good causes, artistic (great painting collection), a gentleman, intelligent. But he doesn’t seem to have been a particularly good father – Edward G Robinson Jnr was a boozer from the age of 12, constantly getting in fights and trouble, having a lousy acting career. His first marriage was also unhappy – she sounds like a bit of a bitch but also every time she had a nervous breakdown and wanted to get a divorce Robinson would send her to a clinic to get “fixed”… until he had a full on affair and wanted to dump her for his new wife. So that sounds a bit creepy. Maybe Robinson spent too much time thinking about his paintings, work and political causes and worry about his family. (The book is a bit hazy on this, apart from pointing out he picked up the tab for his useless son throughout his life.)
If Robinson had a stressful late 40s/50s, he had a very pleasant last decade or so in his life. He remarried happily, was in steady work, developed a love for travel, got involved in civil rights again, had some great roles (including The Cincinnati Kid). This is a good bio, a worthy treatment of an interesting star, being well researched and particularly strong on blacklisting.
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