Career
Hamilton began his film career in 1952. Although he has a substantial body of work in film and television, he is perhaps most famous for his debonair style and his perfect and perpetual suntan.
With his matinee-idol looks, it was sometimes noted that he physically resembled Warren Beatty; Beatty's political satire Bulworth contained a running gag about this, with Hamilton appearing as himself in a brief cameo.
One of his best-known MGM films was the iconic Where the Boys Are (1960), a coming-of-age romantic comedy set during a college student spring break in the Fort Lauderdale area of Florida in which Hamilton played a smooth Ivy League type. Hamilton received a Golden Globe award in 1960 as Most Promising Newcomer (Male).
He went on to a starring role along with George Peppard as a soldier in 1963's The Victors, a World War II story, and as a Confederate captain who kidnaps the wife of a Union officer (Glenn Ford) in a 1967 drama, A Time for Killing.
Hamilton made two memorable bio-pics: Your Cheatin' Heart (1964), in which he portrayed the country-western music legend Hank Williams, followed by Evel Knievel (1971), the life story of the motorcycle daredevil.
A surprise blockbuster hit came his way in 1979 when Hamilton showed an unforeseen flair for comedy. Love at First Bite was the story of Count Dracula's pursuit of a young Manhattan socialite, played by Susan Saint James. It included such scenes as Dracula and his conquest dancing to "I Love the Nightlife" at a disco. The film's box-office success created a popularity surge for Hamilton, who followed it with a comic portrayal of a famed swordsman in 1981's Zorro, the Gay Blade. He was nominated for Golden Globe awards for both Love at First Bite and Zorro.
Film leads dried up quickly, however. In the mid-1980s, Hamilton starred in the sixth season of the ABC Aaron Spelling-produced nighttime television serial Dynasty. Having once played a doctor who uses hypnosis to commit a murder on a 1975 episode of Columbo, Hamilton returned for a second homicide on that long-running Peter Falk detective series in 1991, this time playing the host of an America's Most Wanted-style television show. He later became a semi-regular panelist on the 1998 revival of Match Game.
A big movie break for Hamilton came in 1990 when Francis Coppola cast him as the Corleone family's lawyer in a much-anticipated film, The Godfather, Part III.
In 2003, he hosted The Family, a reality television series on ABC spanning one season in 2003. It starred 10 members from a traditional Italian-American family, each fighting for a $1,000,000 prize.
In 2006, he competed in the second season of ABC's Dancing with the Stars and lasted until the sixth round before being voted off. At age 66 and recovering from knee injuries, Hamilton, unable to match the limber dance moves of his younger competitors, charmed the audience and judges with endearingly silly dances utilizing props including a Zorro mask and sword from Zorro, The Gay Blade.
Also in 2006, it was rumored Hamilton would replace Bob Barker on The Price Is Right. He did an audition and in March 2007, TMZ reported that Hamilton was a frontrunner to replace Barker. According to Reuters, Hamilton was one of the final three contenders to host the show, alongside Mark Steines and Todd Newton. Soon thereafter, however, Drew Carey was named as Barker's successor. Subsequently, Hamilton has hosted the live stage adaptation of the show, The Price Is Right Live!.
In August 2008, Hamilton co-starred in Coma, a web series on Crackle.
Released in 2009, the film My One and Only is loosely based on Hamilton's early life and relationship with his mother.
Hamilton was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame on 12 August 2009 – his 70th birthday. In 1999, a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs, California, Walk of Stars was dedicated to him.
Hamilton appeared as a contestant on the UK edition of I'm a Celebrity…Get Me out of Here! (UK series 9) in November 2009. Hamilton walked out of the jungle on 30 November 2009, telling the other contestants that he wasn't there to win, but to have fun. Hamilton was considered one of the favorites to win the series.
In 2010 Hamilton was chosen as one of David Hasselhoff's roasters in the Comedy Central Roast of David Hasselhoff.
Starting in the fall of 2011, Hamilton starred as "Georges" for the national tour of the Tony-winning revival of La Cage aux Folles. He is still starring in the show as of June 2012.
Read more about this topic: George Hamilton (actor)
Famous quotes containing the word career:
“He was at a starting point which makes many a man’s career a fine subject for betting, if there were any gentlemen given to that amusement who could appreciate the complicated probabilities of an arduous purpose, with all the possible thwartings and furtherings of circumstance, all the niceties of inward balance, by which a man swings and makes his point or else is carried headlong.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“What exacerbates the strain in the working class is the absence of money to pay for services they need, economic insecurity, poor daycare, and lack of dignity and boredom in each partner’s job. What exacerbates it in upper-middle class is the instability of paid help and the enormous demands of the career system in which both partners become willing believers. But the tug between traditional and egalitarian models of marriage runs from top to bottom of the class ladder.”
—Arlie Hochschild (20th century)
“John Brown’s career for the last six weeks of his life was meteor-like, flashing through the darkness in which we live. I know of nothing so miraculous in our history.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)