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 Described in the press as the heir apparent to James Stewart and Jack Lemmon, Jim Hutton broke out of the pack with his funny, awkward TV Thompson in Where the Boys Are (1960). Son of Col. Thomas R. Hutton and Helen Ryan, his parents divorced when he was an infant. Jim recalled seeing his father only twice before his death, and moved to Albany, New York, in 1938. A bright but troublesome child (claiming to have been in five high schools and a boarding school), he excelled as a writer and won a journalism scholarship when he began writing sports for his high school newspaper. At Syracuse University, he lost his position in the school of journalism (and scholarship) when he was bitten by the acting bug. He subsequently lost academic ambition and failed three classes as a freshman. He used his summers to train in summer stock, but his intentions to continue academic pursuits were ended when he was expelled from Syracuse as a sophomore and again at Niagara College as a junior.He lived in Greenwich Village for almost a year to pursue a career on the stage, but when out of money and unable to pay his rent or buy food, he joined the army and was assigned to special services to act in training films. He was later stationed in Berlin, where he founded the American Community Theater, by renovating an abandoned theater for a GI production of the play "Harvey" (which he starred in). Receiving high praise from officers including official commendation, his superior officer agreed to assign Hutton to manage the theater as part of his official duties and he produced, directed, and acted in five productions over two years, receiving the European Theater Award for Best GI Theater. One of his productions, The Caine Mutiny (1954), received the attention of director Douglas Sirk, who offered him the significant role of "Hirschland" in A Time to Love and a Time to Die (1958) as a young Nazi who commits suicide. Using his entire military leave to film for 22 days, Universal was so impressed they offered him a contract, but he still had 18 months of service. Within five days of his military discharge, he had married and moved to Hollywood to pursue a career, but by then the offer was off the table from Universal. He eventually landed at MGM. The first role of significance to get attention (and use his new stage name of Jim Hutton) was the first season The Twilight Zone (1959) episode, And When the Sky Was Opened (1959), which earned the newbie good notice within the industry. Eventually, he landed his breakout role of "TV Thompson" in Where the Boys Are (1960), paired with new-comer Paula Prentiss. He came in third in 1960's Golden Laurel Awards Top Male New Personality, was named one of Motion Picture Herald's Stars of Tomorrow, was a Photoplay Favorite Male Newcomer nominee, and Screen World Award winner for Most Promising Personality.Prentiss and Jim Hutton were immediately paired into three other films, The Honeymoon Machine (1961), Bachelor in Paradise (1961), and The Horizontal Lieutenant (1962). But despite their likable personalities and on-screen chemistry, none of the films captured the magic of the first film. Frustrated, Hutton campaigned for the lead in Period of Adjustment and then refused jobs for 15 months until MGM agreed to give him better roles or dissolve their exclusive contract. He agreed to appear with Connie Francis in the film Looking for Love (1964) if he were let go to pursue work independently.Once free from contracts, he was selected by Sam Peckinpah for the role of the young lieutenant in Major Dundee (1965). Dundee's turbulent production was the primary subject of reviews, yet the subsequent reassessment of the flawed film (particularly by Peckinpah scholars) has garnered Hutton posthumous praise for his youthful and exuberant performance. "Dundee" was followed by several acting veterans taking an interest in the underused actor's career, including Burt Lancaster in The Hallelujah Trail (1965), Cary Grant in Walk Don't Run (1966), and John Wayne in The Green Berets (1968). Like his later-appreciated performance in "Dundee", his role in The Green Berets (1968) was overlooked due to the film's controversial political stance on Vietnam. Yet, it has become common to see Hutton's performance as one of the bright spots in the film, thanks to his ability to incorporate his natural comic skills and cocky swagger into the role of wartime cynical scavenger who becomes the heroic adoptive father of a Vietnamese orphan. His work in these films, and leading roles in the underrated heist farce, Who's Minding the Mint? (1967), showed his growth as an actor. However, when all three of his 1965 releases flopped at the box office, his Hollywood stock took a major tumble, particularly when Gene Kelly dropped him from the lead in of A Guide for the Married Man (1967), one month before production started.Film roles dried up and he was relegated to TV work, which coincided with what he called an eight-year depression. It wasn't until 1975 that he experienced a career comeback with the cult detective series Ellery Queen (1975), which coincided with an upturn of theater work and reunion with his son, actor Timothy Hutton, who moved in with him at this time at 15 years old. Tragically, his comeback didn't last long, as he died of liver cancer in 1979, two days after his 45th birthday.
Bio:
Described in the press as the heir apparent to James Stewart and Jack Lemmon, Jim Hutton broke out of the pack with his funny, awkward TV Thompson in Where the Boys Are (1960). Son of Col. Thomas R. Hutton and Helen Ryan, his parents divorced when he was an infant. Jim recalled seeing his father only twice before his death, and moved to Albany, New York, in 1938. A bright but troublesome child (claiming to have been in five high schools and a boarding school), he excelled as a writer and won a journalism scholarship when he began writing sports for his high school newspaper. At Syracuse University, he lost his position in the school of journalism (and scholarship) when he was bitten by the acting bug. He subsequently lost academic ambition and failed three classes as a freshman. He used his summers to train in summer stock, but his intentions to continue academic pursuits were ended when he was expelled from Syracuse as a sophomore and again at Niagara College as a junior.He lived in Greenwich Village for almost a year to pursue a career on the stage, but when out of money and unable to pay his rent or buy food, he joined the army and was assigned to special services to act in training films. He was later stationed in Berlin, where he founded the American Community Theater, by renovating an abandoned theater for a GI production of the play "Harvey" (which he starred in). Receiving high praise from officers including official commendation, his superior officer agreed to assign Hutton to manage the theater as part of his official duties and he produced, directed, and acted in five productions over two years, receiving the European Theater Award for Best GI Theater. One of his productions, The Caine Mutiny (1954), received the attention of director Douglas Sirk, who offered him the significant role of "Hirschland" in A Time to Love and a Time to Die (1958) as a young Nazi who commits suicide. Using his entire military leave to film for 22 days, Universal was so impressed they offered him a contract, but he still had 18 months of service. Within five days of his military discharge, he had married and moved to Hollywood to pursue a career, but by then the offer was off the table from Universal. He eventually landed at MGM. The first role of significance to get attention (and use his new stage name of Jim Hutton) was the first season The Twilight Zone (1959) episode, And When the Sky Was Opened (1959), which earned the newbie good notice within the industry. Eventually, he landed his breakout role of "TV Thompson" in Where the Boys Are (1960), paired with new-comer Paula Prentiss. He came in third in 1960's Golden Laurel Awards Top Male New Personality, was named one of Motion Picture Herald's Stars of Tomorrow, was a Photoplay Favorite Male Newcomer nominee, and Screen World Award winner for Most Promising Personality.Prentiss and Jim Hutton were immediately paired into three other films, The Honeymoon Machine (1961), Bachelor in Paradise (1961), and The Horizontal Lieutenant (1962). But despite their likable personalities and on-screen chemistry, none of the films captured the magic of the first film. Frustrated, Hutton campaigned for the lead in Period of Adjustment and then refused jobs for 15 months until MGM agreed to give him better roles or dissolve their exclusive contract. He agreed to appear with Connie Francis in the film Looking for Love (1964) if he were let go to pursue work independently.Once free from contracts, he was selected by Sam Peckinpah for the role of the young lieutenant in Major Dundee (1965). Dundee's turbulent production was the primary subject of reviews, yet the subsequent reassessment of the flawed film (particularly by Peckinpah scholars) has garnered Hutton posthumous praise for his youthful and exuberant performance. "Dundee" was followed by several acting veterans taking an interest in the underused actor's career, including Burt Lancaster in The Hallelujah Trail (1965), Cary Grant in Walk Don't Run (1966), and John Wayne in The Green Berets (1968). Like his later-appreciated performance in "Dundee", his role in The Green Berets (1968) was overlooked due to the film's controversial political stance on Vietnam. Yet, it has become common to see Hutton's performance as one of the bright spots in the film, thanks to his ability to incorporate his natural comic skills and cocky swagger into the role of wartime cynical scavenger who becomes the heroic adoptive father of a Vietnamese orphan. His work in these films, and leading roles in the underrated heist farce, Who's Minding the Mint? (1967), showed his growth as an actor. However, when all three of his 1965 releases flopped at the box office, his Hollywood stock took a major tumble, particularly when Gene Kelly dropped him from the lead in of A Guide for the Married Man (1967), one month before production started.Film roles dried up and he was relegated to TV work, which coincided with what he called an eight-year depression. It wasn't until 1975 that he experienced a career comeback with the cult detective series Ellery Queen (1975), which coincided with an upturn of theater work and reunion with his son, actor Timothy Hutton, who moved in with him at this time at 15 years old. Tragically, his comeback didn't last long, as he died of liver cancer in 1979, two days after his 45th birthday.
Tivia:
The father of three, actor Timothy Hutton (born on Aug. 16, 1960) and daughters Heidi Hutton (born in 1959) and Vanity Fair Deputy Editor Rebecca Punch Hutton (born on Sep. 28, 1971).Going to the doctor with respiratory trouble and back pain, he was diagnosed with liver cancer which had spread to his lungs. He was told he had no more than six months to live. Hoping to prolong his life with chemotherapy, he died eight weeks after first checking into the hospital and only four weeks after his condition was made public.Timothy Hutton wore Jim Hutton's hat from Ellery Queen (1975) in Ordinary People (1980) and A Nero Wolfe Mystery (2001). He dedicated his Best Supporting Actor Academy Award from "Ordinary People" to his father, who died four months before filming on "Ordinary People" began and five weeks after seeing his son's first leading role Friendly Fire (1979) from his hospital bed.Milton Berle delivered his eulogy.When asked, Cary Grant cited Hutton as the actor who would follow in his footsteps as a comic leading man.During the early 1960s, he was seen as a new James Stewart. Very tall, gangly, and with a certain absent-minded lilt to his readings of the lines, Hutton seemed to have the abilities to take up where Jimmy Stewart had left off in comedy.Timothy Hutton appeared with his father twice, once as a five-year-old child in an uncredited screen role in Never Too Late (1965), and once on stage as a teenager in the touring company of "Harvey".Was known as a prankster (some mean-spirited) and troublemaker who admitted to "delighting in deflating the egos of higher-ups." In college he stole Syracuse's bulldozer and plowed the blue tulip bed in front of the library (while drunk) the night before the moving up ceremony where he was one of the honorees as class vice-president and was immediately expelled, although argued that his co-conspirator was let off because he was captain of the football team. At Niagara College he claimed to have drained a pond as a prank and was expelled once again for dropping his pants during an awards dinner on a $12 bet, where he was being honored by the faculty as president of the Drama Society. He was nearly demoted in rank for putting alum powder in his commanding officer's bowl of stew, among other pranks he pulled while in the military, almost all on higher-ups.Hutton had an on-again, off-again relationship with actress Yvette Vickers for 15 years, often rumored to be engaged and/or living together by tabloids. Vickers claimed he refused to marry her because of his inability to remain faithful to women. Between both of their second marriages, they rekindled their romances. From the time of his death up to her 2010 death, the troubled Vickers (who suffered substance abuse and paranoid delusions) claimed the equally troubled Hutton had been the one and only love of her life and soul-mate and described him as "a typical Irish Catholic male; hard-drinking, chauvinistic, funny as hell, but with the insecurities of a child." Vickers was discovered by neighbor Susan Savage in April 2011 in a mummified state, suggesting she had died a year earlier.According to Paula Prentiss in her DVD narrative to Where the Boys Are (1960), they were paired because they were, at the time, Hollywood's tallest contract players, he at 6'5" and she at 5'10".Earned money for school by digging ditches on weekends and delivering bananas at night.Acted in more than 40 instructional films for the military as a member of Army Special Services, including The Big Attack aka Citizen Soldier as Big Slim (credited as Dana S. Hutton) which aired on network television despite being made for and with soldiers.His first and last professional role in the theater was the lead in his favorite play, Harvey.Was already a 26-year-old married father of two when he played 20-year-old college student "TV Thompson" in Where the Boys Are (1960).Started acting while serving with the U.S. Army in Germany. Founder and actor/director of the first English-speaking theatre in Berlin.Ida Lupino asked Hutton to play the role of the rival headmaster in The Trouble with Angels (1966) in an uncredited cameo. Lupino had heard him described as a younger, taller Jack Lemmon and added in the line describing his character as "like Jack Lemmon, only younger".Sam Peckinpah nicknamed Jim Hutton "The Yankee" because of his thick, flat, almost-Midwestern accent. Was friendly with the actor despite firing a gun (with blanks) at him in Major Dundee (1965) because Hutton annoyed him while learning to ride a horse, scaring the horse which bucked him off. Notoriously eccentric, Peckinpah described Hutton as "crazy for no reason" because of his constant womanizing and hard-drinking habits, despite enjoying neither activity.Director Richard L. Bare attempted to cast Hutton in several TV series, including additional The Twilight Zone (1959) episodes, but he couldn't convince MGM to change his exclusive film contract. While developing the romantic comedy sitcom You're Only Young Once (1962), he felt Hutton was the only working actor right for the role. He asked Hutton to appear in the screen tests with actresses in order to show the studio the dailies and allow him to take the role. They agreed to allow Hutton to appear in the pilot but refused to break his contract to work on a TV series, full-time.According to producer William Link, Ellery Queen (1975) was created with Hutton in mind after NBC saw his performance in They Call It Murder (1971). Link described him as the most dedicated actor he'd ever worked with. He recalled that Hutton literally moved into his dressing room during the seven-month production, seven days a week. He did this in order to study his script morning and night, and avoid all distractions at home of women and alcohol. But the crew noticed he drank heavily after production wrapped Friday throughout Saturday.Considered Walk Don't Run (1966) his best film and best performance.Youngest daughter Rebecca Punch Hutton, from his second marriage to Lynni Solomon, named her daughter Ellery after his TV character, Ellery Queen.He was against the Vietnam War.Jack Lemmon was his favorite actor.Performed an impromptu scene in the commissary of MGM to get an audition for Where the Boys Are (1960).His first wife made the statement "he told me his wife and family were standing in the way of his career" when seeking a divorce. Despite this, Hutton frequently stayed at her home when visiting the family.He and Paula Prentiss were in five movies together: Where the Boys Are (1960), The Honeymoon Machine (1961), Bachelor in Paradise (1961), The Horizontal Lieutenant (1962), and Looking for Love (1964).Lived with Susan Oliver throughout 1963, but they refused to marry after his divorce and parted when she began focusing on her career as a pilot.Claimed to run three miles every day with a pedometer and drank a daily smoothie of three eggs yolks, wheat germ, honey, almonds, and raw milk he prepared the night before to ferment and ate at least one steak every day.Was the first person to win the New York State Oratorical high school competition two years in a row.Close friend of Merlin Olsen.Although he resembled actor Robert Hutton, they were not related.Parents divorced in 1964.He was a lifelong liberal Democrat.Sister Heidi born in 1960. |
| Name: |
Jim Hutton |
Type: |
Actor (IMDB) |
| Area: |
All World |
Platform: |
IMDB |
| Category: |
|
Business scope: |
Actor |
| Products for sale: |
Actor |
| Model rank: |
9835 |
| Last update: |
2024-07-01 03:45:16 |
| Height: |
6' 4?' (1.95 m) |
| Biography: |
Described in the press as the heir apparent to James Stewart and Jack Lemmon, Jim Hutton broke out of the pack with his funny, awkward TV Thompson in Where the Boys Are (1960). Son of Col. Thomas R. Hutton and Helen Ryan, his parents divorced wh |
| Trivia: |
The father of three, actor Timothy Hutton (born on Aug. 16, 1960) and daughters Heidi Hutton (born in 1959) and Vanity Fair Deputy Editor Rebecca Punch Hutton (born on Sep. 28, 1971).Going to the doctor with respiratory trouble and back pain, he was diagnosed with liver cancer which had spread to his lungs. He was told he had no more than six months to live. Hoping to prolong his life with chemotherapy, he died eight weeks after first checking into the hospital and only four weeks after his condition was made public.Timothy Hutton wore Jim Hutton's hat from Ellery Queen (1975) in Ordinary People (1980) and A Nero Wolfe Mystery (2001). He dedicated his Best Supporting Actor Academy Award from "Ordinary People" to his father, who died four months before filming on "Ordinary People" began and five weeks after seeing his son's first leading role Friendly Fire (1979) from his hospital bed.Milton Berle delivered his eulogy.When asked, Cary Grant cited Hutton as the actor who would follow in his footsteps as a comic leading man.During the early 1960s, he was seen as a new James Stewart. Very tall, gangly, and with a certain absent-minded lilt to his readings of the lines, Hutton seemed to have the abilities to take up where Jimmy Stewart had left off in comedy.Timothy Hutton appeared with his father twice, once as a five-year-old child in an uncredited screen role in Never Too Late (1965), and once on stage as a teenager in the touring company of "Harvey".Was known as a prankster (some mean-spirited) and troublemaker who admitted to "delighting in deflating the egos of higher-ups." In college he stole Syracuse's bulldozer and plowed the blue tulip bed in front of the library (while drunk) the night before the moving up ceremony where he was one of the honorees as class vice-president and was immediately expelled, although argued that his co-conspirator was let off because he was captain of the football team. At Niagara College he claimed to have drained a pond as a prank and was expelled once again for dropping his pants during an awards dinner on a $12 bet, where he was being honored by the faculty as president of the Drama Society. He was nearly demoted in rank for putting alum powder in his commanding officer's bowl of stew, among other pranks he pulled while in the military, almost all on higher-ups.Hutton had an on-again, off-again relationship with actress Yvette Vickers for 15 years, often rumored to be engaged and/or living together by tabloids. Vickers claimed he refused to marry her because of his inability to remain faithful to women. Between both of their second marriages, they rekindled their romances. From the time of his death up to her 2010 death, the troubled Vickers (who suffered substance abuse and paranoid delusions) claimed the equally troubled Hutton had been the one and only love of her life and soul-mate and described him as "a typical Irish Catholic male; hard-drinking, chauvinistic, funny as hell, but with the insecurities of a child." Vickers was discovered by neighbor Susan Savage in April 2011 in a mummified state, suggesting she had died a year earlier.According to Paula Prentiss in her DVD narrative to Where the Boys Are (1960), they were paired because they were, at the time, Hollywood's tallest contract players, he at 6'5" and she at 5'10".Earned money for school by digging ditches on weekends and delivering bananas at night.Acted in more than 40 instructional films for the military as a member of Army Special Services, including The Big Attack aka Citizen Soldier as Big Slim (credited as Dana S. Hutton) which aired on network television despite being made for and with soldiers.His first and last professional role in the theater was the lead in his favorite play, Harvey.Was already a 26-year-old married father of two when he played 20-year-old college student "TV Thompson" in Where the Boys Are (1960).Started acting while serving with the U.S. Army in Germany. Founder and actor/director of the first English-speaking theatre in Berlin.Ida Lupino asked Hutton to play the role of the rival headmaster in The Trouble with Angels (1966) in an uncredited cameo. Lupino had heard him described as a younger, taller Jack Lemmon and added in the line describing his character as "like Jack Lemmon, only younger".Sam Peckinpah nicknamed Jim Hutton "The Yankee" because of his thick, flat, almost-Midwestern accent. Was friendly with the actor despite firing a gun (with blanks) at him in Major Dundee (1965) because Hutton annoyed him while learning to ride a horse, scaring the horse which bucked him off. Notoriously eccentric, Peckinpah described Hutton as "crazy for no reason" because of his constant womanizing and hard-drinking habits, despite enjoying neither activity.Director Richard L. Bare attempted to cast Hutton in several TV series, including additional The Twilight Zone (1959) episodes, but he couldn't convince MGM to change his exclusive film contract. While developing the romantic comedy sitcom You're Only Young Once (1962), he felt Hutton was the only working actor right for the role. He asked Hutton to appear in the screen tests with actresses in order to show the studio the dailies and allow him to take the role. They agreed to allow Hutton to appear in the pilot but refused to break his contract to work on a TV series, full-time.According to producer William Link, Ellery Queen (1975) was created with Hutton in mind after NBC saw his performance in They Call It Murder (1971). Link described him as the most dedicated actor he'd ever worked with. He recalled that Hutton literally moved into his dressing room during the seven-month production, seven days a week. He did this in order to study his script morning and night, and avoid all distractions at home of women and alcohol. But the crew noticed he drank heavily after production wrapped Friday throughout Saturday.Considered Walk Don't Run (1966) his best film and best performance.Youngest daughter Rebecca Punch Hutton, from his second marriage to Lynni Solomon, named her daughter Ellery after his TV character, Ellery Queen.He was against the Vietnam War.Jack Lemmon was his favorite actor.Performed an impromptu scene in the commissary of MGM to get an audition for Where the Boys Are (1960).His first wife made the statement "he told me his wife and family were standing in the way of his career" when seeking a divorce. Despite this, Hutton frequently stayed at her home when visiting the family.He and Paula Prentiss were in five movies together: Where the Boys Are (1960), The Honeymoon Machine (1961), Bachelor in Paradise (1961), The Horizontal Lieutenant (1962), and Looking for Love (1964).Lived with Susan Oliver throughout 1963, but they refused to marry after his divorce and parted when she began focusing on her career as a pilot.Claimed to run three miles every day with a pedometer and drank a daily smoothie of three eggs yolks, wheat germ, honey, almonds, and raw milk he prepared the night before to ferment and ate at least one steak every day.Was the first person to win the New York State Oratorical high school competition two years in a row.Close friend of Merlin Olsen.Although he resembled actor Robert Hutton, they were not related.Parents divorced in 1964.He was a lifelong liberal Democrat.Sister Heidi born in 1960. |
| Trademarks: |
Very tall and thin with lanky arms and legs
Brash romantic leads in screwball and slapstick comedies
Bright blue eyes and tendency to speak from the side of his mouth |
| Quotes: |
[1964]: My one ambition has nothing to do with acting. I hope to establish a kennel near the ocean and raise prize Silver German Shepherd dogs. You see, I'm used to having a house to myself and can't adjust to apartment dwelling and the closeness of well-meaning neighbours. Everyone worries about a man living alone. When I return from work I find pies, cakes and pots of spaghetti cooked by those who are convinced I'll starve to death.
<br />
<hr>
comedy is instinctive. You're either born with it, or you don't have it
<br />
<hr>
You don't go around saying funny things in good comedy films. It's an attitude. You play it straight |
| Salaries: |
Hellfighters (1968) - $125,000 .00 |
| Job title: |
Actor |
| Others works: |
(1967) Print ads: Coppertone suntan products.
(1965) Unsold pilot: Starred in a pilot for a sitcom to be called "Barney". |
| Spouse: |
Lynni M Solomon (March 30, 1970 - December 1973) (divorced, 1 child)Maryline Poole (December 1958 - February 20, 1963) (divorced, 2 children) |
| Children: |
Timothy HuttonPunch Hutton |
| Parents: |
Thomas Radcliffe Hutton
Helen Mae Scottebo |
| Relatives: |
Noah Hutton (Grandchild) |
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