Eldred Gregory Peck( April 5, 1916 – June 12, 2003) was an American actor and one of the most popular film stars from the 1940s to the 1970s. In 1999, the American Film Institute named Peck the 12th- topmost manly star of Classic Hollywood Cinema.
After studying at the Neighborhood Playhouse with Sanford Meisner, Peck beganappearing in stage products, acting in over 50 plays and three Broadway products. He first gained critical success in The Keys of the Kingdom( 1944), a JohnM. Stahl – directed drama which earned him his first Academy Award nomination. He starred in a series of successful flicks, including romantic- drama The Valley of Decision( 1944), Alfred Hitchcock’s Spellbound( 1945), and family film The Yearling( 1946). He encountered lukewarm marketable reviews at the end of the 1940s, his performancesincluding The Paradine Case( 1947) and The Great wrongdoer( 1948). Peck reachedglobal recognition in the 1950s and 1960s, appearing back- to- back in the book- to- film adaption of Captain Horatio Hornblower( 1951) and biblical drama David and Bathsheba( 1951). He starred alongside Ava Gardner in The Snows of Kilimanjaro( 1952) and Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday( 1953), which earned Peck a Golden Globe award.
Other notable Flicks in which he appeared include Moby Dick( 1956, and its 1998mini-series), The ordnance of Navarone( 1961), Cape Fear( 1962, and its 1991 remake), The Omen( 1976), and The Boys from Brazil( 1978). Throughout his career, he frequentlyportrayed protagonists with” fiber” within a moral setting.( 1) Gentleman’s Agreement( 1947) centered on motifs of antisemitism, while Peck’s character in TwelveO’Clock High( 1949) dealt withpost-traumatic stress complaint during World War II. He won the Academy Award for Stylish Actor for his performance as Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird( 1962), an adaption of the ultramodern classic of the same name which revolved around ethnical inequality, for which he entered universalsun. In 1983, he starred contrary Christopher Plummer in The Scarlet and The Black as HughO’Flaherty, a unqualified clerk who saved thousands of escaped kindred POWs and Jewish people in Rome during the Second World War.
Peck was also active in politics, challenging the HouseUn-American ConditioningCommittee in 1947 and was regarded as a political opponent by President Richard Nixon. President LyndonB. Johnson recognized Peck with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1969 for his continuance philanthropic sweats. Peck failed in his sleepfrom bronchopneumonia at the age of 87.
