11-22-2022, 03:16 AM
Last living actor with a credited role in Gone With the Wind
Theodore Matthew Michael Kuhn Jr. (September 21, 1932 – November 20, 2022) was an American actor. He started his career as a child actor, active on-screen during the Golden Age of Hollywood. He is most noted for having played Beau Wilkes in Gone with the Wind (1939).[1]
Kuhn also appeared in Juarez (1939), A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945), Red River (1948), and Broken Arrow (1950). He left the film industry in 1956, making his final acting appearance on the TV show Alfred Hitchcock Presents that year.
Born in Waukegan, Illinois of German descent to Mickey Snr. and Pearl Hicks, he gained fame as a child actor in the 1930s and appeared opposite such stars as Conrad Nagel and Leslie Howard, amongst others.[2] His first fame came when he won the role auditioned for by 100 other child actors in playing Beau Wilkes (the son of Leslie Howard and Olivia de Havilland's characters Ashley Wilkes and Melanie Hamilton), in Gone with the Wind in 1939.
Kuhn went on to appear in Juarez (1939) opposite Bette Davis, as the adoptive son of John Wayne in Red River, and then in Broken Arrow starring James Stewart.
Featuring in the film A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), this role would reunite him with Vivien Leigh twelve years after they first worked together in Gone with the Wind. In A Streetcar Named Desire, Kuhn played a sailor who directs Leigh's character Blanche to the correct streetcar which will take her to her sister's neighborhood at the beginning of the film. He was therefore acheived the distinction of being the only actor to share screen time with Vivien Leigh in each of her Academy Award winning performances, and was the last credited surviving actor in both films.[3]
Kuhn served in the U.S. Navy from 1951 until 1955 and worked as an aircraft electrician there.[1]
Kuhn left the film business in 1956 and worked for American Airlines from 1965 to 1995[1] and the Boston airport in administrative positions until his retirement. He regularly visited film festivals dealing with his films.
Following Dame Olivia de Havilland's death on July 26, 2020, Kuhn became the last surviving credited cast member[4] from Gone with the Wind.[5]
Kuhn and his wife, Barbara Kuhn, married in 1985 and had two children.[6][7] As of 2017, Kuhn was living in Naples, Florida, and volunteered four hours per week at a local hospital.[8] Kuhn died in Naples on November 20, 2022, at the age of 90.[7]
In 2005, Kuhn received a Golden Boot Award, an award given to acknowledge significant contributions to the Western genre.[9]
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Theodore Matthew Michael Kuhn Jr. (September 21, 1932 – November 20, 2022) was an American actor. He started his career as a child actor, active on-screen during the Golden Age of Hollywood. He is most noted for having played Beau Wilkes in Gone with the Wind (1939).[1]
Kuhn also appeared in Juarez (1939), A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945), Red River (1948), and Broken Arrow (1950). He left the film industry in 1956, making his final acting appearance on the TV show Alfred Hitchcock Presents that year.
Born in Waukegan, Illinois of German descent to Mickey Snr. and Pearl Hicks, he gained fame as a child actor in the 1930s and appeared opposite such stars as Conrad Nagel and Leslie Howard, amongst others.[2] His first fame came when he won the role auditioned for by 100 other child actors in playing Beau Wilkes (the son of Leslie Howard and Olivia de Havilland's characters Ashley Wilkes and Melanie Hamilton), in Gone with the Wind in 1939.
Kuhn went on to appear in Juarez (1939) opposite Bette Davis, as the adoptive son of John Wayne in Red River, and then in Broken Arrow starring James Stewart.
Featuring in the film A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), this role would reunite him with Vivien Leigh twelve years after they first worked together in Gone with the Wind. In A Streetcar Named Desire, Kuhn played a sailor who directs Leigh's character Blanche to the correct streetcar which will take her to her sister's neighborhood at the beginning of the film. He was therefore acheived the distinction of being the only actor to share screen time with Vivien Leigh in each of her Academy Award winning performances, and was the last credited surviving actor in both films.[3]
Kuhn served in the U.S. Navy from 1951 until 1955 and worked as an aircraft electrician there.[1]
Kuhn left the film business in 1956 and worked for American Airlines from 1965 to 1995[1] and the Boston airport in administrative positions until his retirement. He regularly visited film festivals dealing with his films.
Following Dame Olivia de Havilland's death on July 26, 2020, Kuhn became the last surviving credited cast member[4] from Gone with the Wind.[5]
Kuhn and his wife, Barbara Kuhn, married in 1985 and had two children.[6][7] As of 2017, Kuhn was living in Naples, Florida, and volunteered four hours per week at a local hospital.[8] Kuhn died in Naples on November 20, 2022, at the age of 90.[7]
In 2005, Kuhn received a Golden Boot Award, an award given to acknowledge significant contributions to the Western genre.[9]
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The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.