Taylor began his career in films in 1934 when he signed with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. He won his first leading role the following year in Magnificent Obsession. His popularity increased during the late 1930s and 1940s with appearances in Camille (1936), A Yank at Oxford (1938), Waterloo Bridge (1940), and Bataan (1943). During World War II, he served in the United States Naval Air Forces, where he worked as a flight instructor and appeared in instructional films. From 1959 to 1962, he starred in the television series The Detectives Starring Robert Taylor. In 1966, he assumed hosting duties from his friend Ronald Reagan on the series Death Valley Days.

Taylor was married to actress Barbara Stanwyck from 1939 to 1952. He married actress Ursula Thiess in 1954, and they had two children. A chain smoker, Taylor died of lung cancer at the age of 57.

Career
HE SIgned a seven-year contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer with an initial salary of $35 per week, which rose to $2500 by 1936. The studio changed his name to Robert Taylor. He made his film debut in the 1934 comedy Handy Andy, starring Will Rogers (on loan to Fox Studios).

His first leading role came by accident. In 1934 Taylor was on the MGM payroll as "the test boy," a male juvenile who would be filmed opposite various young ingenues in screen tests. In late 1934, when MGM began production of its new short-subject series Crime Does Not Pay with the dramatic short Buried Loot, the actor who had been cast fell ill and could not appear. The director sent for the test boy to substitute for the missing actor. Taylor's dramatic performance, as an embezzler who deliberately disfigures himself to avoid detection, was so memorable that Taylor immediately was signed for feature films.

In 1935, Irene Dunne requested him for her leading man in Magnificent Obsession. This was followed by Camille with Greta Garbo.

Throughout the late 1930s, Taylor appeared in films of varying genres including the musicals Broadway Melody of 1936 and Broadway Melody of 1938, and the British comedy A Yank at Oxford with Vivien Leigh. Throughout 1940 and 1941 he argued in favor of American entry into World War II, and was sharply critical of the isolationist movement. During this time he said he was "100% pro-British". In 1940, he reteamed with Leigh in Mervyn LeRoy's drama Waterloo Bridge.

After being given the nickname "The Man with the Perfect Profile", Taylor began breaking away from his perfect leading man image and began appearing in darker roles beginning in 1941. That year he played the title role in Billy the Kid, followed by the same the next year in the film noir Johnny Eager with Lana Turner. After playing a tough sergeant in Bataan in 1943, Taylor contributed to the war effort by becoming a flying instructor in the U.S. Naval Air Corps. During this time, he also starred in instructional films and narrated the 1944 documentary The Fighting Lady.

After the war he appeared in a series of edgy roles, including the neo-noir Undercurrent (1946) and drama High Wall (1947). In 1949 he co-starred with Elizabeth Taylor in the suspense Conspirator, which Hedda Hopper described as "another one of Taylor's pro-British films". Taylor responded to this by saying "And it won't be the last!" However, both Hopper and Taylor were members of the anticommunist organization the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, as were Taylor's friends John Wayne, Walt Disney and Gary Cooper. For this reason Hopper always spoke favorably of Taylor, despite him disagreeing with her over what she saw as his "Anglophilia" and what he saw as her "Anglophobia". In 1950, Taylor landed the role of General Marcus Vinicius in Quo Vadis with Deborah Kerr. The epic film was a hit, grossing US$11 million in its first run. The following year, he starred in the film version of Walter Scott's classic Ivanhoe, followed by 1953's Knights of the Round Table and The Adventures of Quentin Durward, all filmed in England. Of the three only Ivanhoe was a critical and financial success. Taylor also filmed Valley of the Kings in Egypt in 1954.

By the mid-1950s, Taylor began to concentrate on westerns, his preferred genre. He starred in a comedy western Many Rivers to Cross in 1955 co-starring Eleanor Parker. In 1958, he shared the lead with Richard Widmark in the edgy John Sturges western The Law and Jake Wade. Also in 1958, he left MGM and formed Robert Taylor Productions, and the following year, he starred in the television series The Detectives Starring Robert Taylor (1959–1962). Following the end of the series in 1962, Taylor continued to appear in films and television shows, including A House Is Not a Home and two episodes of Hondo.

Robert Taylor received the 1953 World Film Favorite – Male, award at the Golden Globes (tied with Alan Ladd).

In 1964, Taylor co-starred with his former wife Barbara Stanwyck in William Castle's psychological horror film The Night Walker. In 1965, after filming Johnny Tiger in Florida, Taylor took over the role of narrator in the television series Death Valley Days when Ronald Reagan left to pursue a career in politics. Taylor would remain with the series until his death in 1969.

Taylor traveled to Europe to film Savage Pampas (1966), The Glass Sphinx (1967) and The Day the Hot Line Got Hot (1968).

Quo Vadis (Latin for "Where are you going?") is a 1951 American epic film set in ancient Rome during the final years of Emperor Nero's reign, based on the 1896 novel of the same title by Polish Nobel Laureate author Henryk Sienkiewicz. Produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and filmed in Technicolor, it was directed by Mervyn LeRoy from a screenplay by S. N. Behrman, Sonya Levien, and John Lee Mahin. It is the fourth screen adaptation of Sienkiewicz's novel. The film stars Robert Taylor, Deborah Kerr, Leo Genn, and Peter Ustinov, and features Patricia Laffan, Finlay Currie, Abraham Sofaer, Marina Berti, Buddy Baer, and Felix Aylmer. Future Italian stars Sophia Loren and Bud Spencer appeared as uncredited extras. The score is by Miklós Rózsa and the cinematography by Robert Surtees and William V. Skall.

The story, set between 64–68 AD, combines both historical and fictional events and characters, and compresses the key events of that period into the space of only a few weeks. Its main theme is the Roman Empire’s conflict with Christianity and persecution of Christians in the final years of the Julio-Claudian line. Unlike his illustrious and powerful predecessor, Emperor Claudius, Nero proved corrupt and destructive, and his actions eventually threatened to destroy Rome's previously peaceful social order. The title refers to an incident in the apocryphal Acts of Peter.^[2]

The film was nominated for eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and it was such a huge box office success that it was credited with single-handedly rescuing MGM from the brink of bankruptcy. Peter Ustinov won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture, and Robert Surtees and William V. Skall won the award for Best Cinematography

Plot

Marcus Vinicius is a Roman military commander and the legate of the XIV Gemina. Returning from wars in Britain and Gaul, he falls in love with Lygia, a devout Christian; in spite of this, he continually tries to win her affections. Though she grew up as the foster daughter of Aulus Plautius, a retired Roman general, Lygia is legally a Lygian hostage of Rome in the old general's care. Petronius, Marcus' uncle, persuades Nero to give her to his nephew as a reward for his services. Lygia resents this arrangement, but eventually falls in love with Marcus.

Meanwhile, Nero's atrocities become increasingly outrageous and his behavior more irrational. After Nero burns Rome and blames the Christians, Marcus sets out to rescue Lygia and her family. Nero arrests them, along with all the other Christians, and condemns them to be slaughtered in his Circus; some are killed by lions. Petronius, Nero's most trusted advisor, warns him that the Christians will be celebrated as martyrs, but he cannot change the emperor's mind. Then, tired of Nero's insanity and suspecting that he may be about to turn on him, too, Petronius composes a letter to Nero expressing his derision for the emperor (which he previously had concealed to avoid being murdered by him) and commits suicide by severing an artery in his wrist. His slavegirl Eunice (who has fallen in love with him) elects to die with him, despite being freed. The Christian apostle Peter has also been arrested after returning to Rome in response to a sign from the Lord, and he marries Marcus and Lygia in the Circus prisons. Peter is later crucified upside-down, a form of execution conceived by Nero's Praetorian Guard as an expression of mockery.

Poppaea, Nero's wife, who lusts after Marcus, devises a diabolical revenge for his rejection of her. Lygia is tied to a stake in the Circus and a wild bull is released into the arena. Lygia's bodyguard Ursus must attempt to kill the bull with his bare hands to save Lygia from being gored to death. Marcus is taken to the emperor's box and forced to watch, to the outrage of his officers, who are among the spectators. Ursus is able to topple the bull, though, and break its neck. Massively impressed by Ursus's victory, the crowd exhorts Nero to spare the couple. He refuses to do so, even after four of his courtiers, Seneca, architect Phaon, poet Lucan, and musician Terpnos add their endorsement of the mob's demands. Marcus then breaks free of his bonds, leaps into the arena, and frees Lygia with the help of the loyal troops from his own legion. Marcus accuses Nero of burning Rome and announces that General Galba is at that moment marching on the city, intent on replacing Nero, and hails him as new Emperor of Rome.

The crowd revolts, now firmly believing that Nero, not the Christians, is responsible for the burning of Rome. Nero flees to his palace, where he strangles Poppaea, blaming her for inciting him to scapegoat the Christians. Then Acte, Nero's discarded mistress who is still in love with him, appears and offers him a dagger to end his own life before the mob storming the palace kills him. Nero cannot do it, so Acte helps him to push the dagger into his chest, and he dies.

Marcus, Lygia, and Ursus are now free, and they leave Rome for Marcus' estate in Sicily. By the roadside, Peter's crook, which he had left behind when he returned to Rome, has sprouted blossoms. A radiant light appears and a chorus intones, "I am the way, the truth, and the life," words spoken by Jesus (John 14:6, New Testament).

Cast

The film features many uncredited supporting parts and cameos: including Elizabeth Taylor as a Christian prisoner in arena, Sophia Loren as a Lygian slave, Christopher Lee as a chariot driver, Clelia Matania as Parmenida the hairdresser, Marika Aba as the Assyrian Dancer at Nero's banquet, Richard Garrick as a slave with Marcus at Triumph, Giuseppe Tosi as a wrestler at Nero's banquet, Adrienne Corri as an imprisoned Christian woman, Bud Spencer as an Imperial Guard, and Robin Hughes as Jesus in a flashback tableaux. The narration was provided by an uncredited Walter Pidgeon.

Production

Pre-production

In the late 1930s, MGM bought the talking picture rights to the 1896 novel Quo Vadis from author Henryk Sienkiewicz's heirs. (At the same time they had to buy the 1924 silent screen version.) The company originally intended to make the film in Italy, but the outbreak of WWII caused it to be postponed. After the war, production was restarted. A lease was obtained on the huge Cinecitta Studios, eight miles outside Rome, with its 148 acres and nine soundstages.

After months of preparation, the art director, costume designer, and set decorator arrived in Rome in 1948. Construction of the outdoor sets began at once: the huge Circus of Nero and exterior of Nero's palace, a whole section of Ancient Rome, a great bridge, and the Plautius villa. The manufacture of thousands of costumes for extras began, along with drapes and carpets, metal and glass goblets, and 10 chariots. Official permission was granted to refurbish a section of the Appian Way. One of Hollywood's foremost animal experts began to procure lions, horses, bulls, and other animals from around Europe. Well in advance of filming, the producer, director, chief cinematographer, and casting director arrived in Rome. The film finally went into production on Monday, May 22, 1950.

Casting

The film was originally cast in 1949 with Elizabeth Taylor as Lygia and Gregory Peck as Marcus Vinicius. When the production changed hands the following year, the roles went to Deborah Kerr and Robert Taylor. Elizabeth Taylor had an uncredited cameo role as a Christian in the Circus prisons.

Although most of the cast was British and a few Italian (Marina Berti, Alfredo Varelli, Roberto Ottaviano), Robert Taylor was certainly not the only American. Others included Buddy Baer (Ursus), Peter Miles (Nazarius), Arthur Walge (Croton), and William Tubbs (Anaxander). Also, several were among the uncredited cast; perhaps the most notable of these was 70-year-old Irish-American character actor Richard Garrick as the public slave who stands behind Marcus in his Triumph chariot, holding a victory laurel above his head, and repeating "Remember thou art only a man." Ustinov recalled how he was cast as Nero in 1949: "An exciting proposition came my way when I was 28 years old. MGM were going to remake Quo Vadis, and I was a candidate for the role of Nero. Arthur Hornblow [Jr] was to be the producer, and I was tested by [the director] John Huston. I threw everything I knew into this test, and to my surprise, John Huston did little to restrain me, encouraging me in confidential whispers to be even madder. Apparently the test was a success, but then the huge machine came to a halt, and the project was postponed for a year. At the end of the year, the producer was Sam Zimbalist and the director Mervyn LeRoy. They also approved my test, but warned me in a wire that I might be found to be a little young for the part. I cabled back that if they postponed again, I might be too old, since Nero died at 31. A second cable from them read 'Historical Research Has Proved You Correct Stop The Part Is Yours'

Clark Gable turned down the role of Marcus Vinicius very early in the film's production history because he thought he would look ridiculous in Roman costumes.

Sophia Loren appeared in the film as an extra. Italian star Bud Spencer (real name: Carlo Pedersoli) also had an uncredited extra role as a Praetorian guardsman inside Nero's summer palace at Antium. (He answers Nero, but his voice may be dubbed.)

Audrey Hepburn, still widely unknown when the film was released, was considered for the part of Lygia. Director Mervyn LeRoy wanted to cast her but the role went to established MGM contract star Deborah Kerr, instead. Wardrobe stills of her in costume for the film still exist.

Patricia Laffan was selected by the producer and director for the major role of Poppaea after they watched a screen test she made for a smaller part in the film

At 107 years of age (on 31 August 2021), Italian actor Alfredo Varelli (Lucan) may be the oldest surviving person associated with the film

Ustinov relates in his autobiography Dear Me that director Mervyn LeRoy summarized the manner in which he envisioned Ustinov should play the Emperor Nero, very salaciously, as

Nero ... The way I see him ... He's a guy plays with himself nights.... At the time I thought it a preposterous assessment, but a little later I was not so sure. It was a profundity at its most workaday level, and it led me to the eventual conviction that no nation can make Roman pictures as well as the Americans ... The inevitable vulgarities of the script contributed as much to its authenticity as its rare felicities. I felt then as I feel today, in spite of the carping of critical voices, that Quo Vadis, good or bad according to taste, was an extraordinarily authentic film, and the nonsense Nero was sometimes made to speak was very much like the nonsense Nero probably did speak.

Filming

Produced for $7 million, it was the most expensive film ever made at the time. It became MGM's largest grosser since Gone with the Wind (1939). Filmed at the sprawling Cinecitta Studios that had been opened by Benito Mussolini in 1924 as part of the dictator's master plan to make Rome the pre-eminent world capital. (Mussolini and Hollywood producer Hal Roach later negotiated to form the R.A.M. ["Roach and Mussolini"] Corporation, which was ultimately aborted. This business alliance with the Fascist state horrified 1930s Hollywood moguls and ultimately led to Roach defecting from his MGM distribution deal to United Artists in 1937.)

Filming in postwar Italy offered American studios immense facilities and cheap Italian labor and extras, of which thousands were required. Hollywood returned to Cinecitta often, producing many of its biggest spectacles there, including Helen of Troy (1956), Ben-Hur (1959), and Cleopatra (1963) – the latter two dwarfing Quo Vadis in scale. The studio would later be used by many Italian producers and directors, including Federico Fellini. The first use of the phrase "Hollywood on the Tiber", which has come to refer to a golden era of American runaway film production in Italy, was as the title of a Time article in the issue dated June 26, 1950, published while Quo Vadis was being shot in Rome.

Numerous Italian locations – as many as 10 – were used in the film. With the exception of the Appian Way, most of these have not been identified, but the final stage of the chariot chase was filmed along Bolgheri's 2000-year-old Viale dei Cipressi (Avenue of Cypresses). This famous landmark in Livorno, Tuscany, is easily recognizable.

Composer Miklós Rózsa said that he wrote most of his score at the Culver City studios while the film was being shot in Italy:

[The] rushes were being sent back to Hollywood for cutting at the same time as they were being cut back in Rome ... I set to work so that at least something was ready, even if it had to be modified later. I worked with the chief supervising editor, Margaret Booth, whose technical knowledge is incomporable ... Finally, the Rome contingent arrived home with their version. It wasn't so very different from the one that Margaret had put together, and there were no insuperable problems. Sam Zimbalist was amazed and delighted that I had all the music ready in three weeks, thanks to the work Margaret and I had already done.

In the summer of 1950, when Quo Vadis was in production, Rome was in the grip of an intense heatwave, as Peter Ustinov recalled: "Rome was in the throes of Holy Year, and bursting with pilgrims. It was also one of the hottest summers on record." The heat affected not only the cast and crew, but also the lions. Mervyn LeRoy recalled that because of the heat, the lions were reluctant to enter the arena. Due to equipment shortages in Italy, MGM had to import a reported two hundred tons of generators, lights and other electrical equipment from Culver City.

Anthony Mann worked on the film as an uncredited second-unit director. He spent 24 nights (four working weeks) on the Cinecitta backlot shooting scenes for the Burning of Rome sequence. However, he was not the co-director of the film, as some of his admirers have claimed.^[The soundstage scenes for the same sequence were directed by Mervyn LeRoy.

The film holds the record for the most costumes used in one movie: 32,000. At one point in the film, Nero shows his court a scale model illustrating his plans for the rebuilding of Rome as a new city to be called Neropolis. Studio publicity claimed that this was the famous model of Ancient Rome housed in the Museum of Roman Civilization and that it had been borrowed from the Italian government. (This was originally constructed by Mussolini's government for a 1937 exhibition of Roman architecture.) However, the museum model is of fourth-century Rome, not of first-century Rome as it would have looked when rebuilt after the Great Fire of AD 64. The screen model looks nothing like the museum model. (It was almost certainly constructed especially for the film – perhaps by its special effects model-maker, Donald Jahraus.)

Whitman's is one of the largest and oldest brands of boxed chocolates in the United States. Whitman's confections have been produced since 1842, originally by Stephen Whitman in Philadelphia and currently by Kansas City, Missouri-based Russell Stover Candies.

History

Whitman's confections have been produced for over 175 years. Originally a "confectionery and fruiterer shoppe" set up in 1842 by 19-year-old Stephen F. Whitman on the Philadelphia waterfront, Whitman's first became popular with traveling sailors and their wives. They would often bring imported fruits, nuts, and cocoa which were obtained during their voyages to Mr. Whitman so that he could make the popular European confections people craved in that era. Before long, Whitman's chocolates were popular throughout the northeastern United States. Whitman's produced the first pre-packaged candy in 1854—a box of sugar plums adorned with curlicues and rosebuds. Whitman's began advertising in newspapers, shortly before the beginning of the Civil War, and the business grew so large, that in 1866, the company occupied an entire building at 12th and Market Streets in Philadelphia. In 1877, he introduced Instantaneous Chocolates in tin boxes, that became much-admired. Whitman's later became Stephen F. Whitman & Son, Inc. Whitman's introduced the Whitman's Sampler in 1912, becoming the first use of cellophane by the candy industry. In 1915, the messenger boy was added to the Whitman's Sampler box, and became a symbol of quality. In 1946, the company helped General Electric develop a refrigerated display case to guard the product against warmer temperatures and extend the selling season through the summer months.

In the early 1960s, Whitman's was purchased by Pet, Inc., a manufacturer of evaporated milk as part of the company's attempt to become a food products conglomerate. Pet was taken over in 1978 by IC Industries (a holding company for the Illinois Central Railroad's non-rail assets), which eventually decided to focus on food and in 1988 took the name Whitman Corporation after the spinoff of some non-food operations because Whitman's was its best-known brand name. However, in 1991, Pet (including Whitman) was again spun off as the parent company decided to narrow its focus further (eventually becoming PepsiAmericas). In 1993, Pet sold the Whitman's brand to Russell Stover Candies, the major supplier of boxed candy in the United States. In July 2014, Russell Stover was acquired by the international company Lindt & Sprüngli. In 1984, Whitman's introduced its light chocolate. In 1987, Whitman's celebrated its 75th anniversary, and the Whitman's Sampler box had gained a new look. In 1991, the Smithsonian Institution acquired the Whitman's Chocolates Collection of print advertisements. In 1994, Whitman's teamed up with Peanuts characters to introduce its Peanuts-themed Whitman's products.

Whitman's Sampler

The online Russell Stover history states that the Whitman's Sampler was introduced in 1912, and by 1915 it was the most popular of Whitman's line of candy. Also in 1915 the Messenger Boy molded chocolate piece was added to the assortment.^[6] During World War II, servicemen and women who got a Whitman's Sampler from family and friends spread the word about it once they returned home. Over the decades, it reached a level in American pop culture in that it was mentioned in many TV shows, movies, and the like. The stitching design of the package was inspired by grandma's needlework. The package of the box resembles the folk art sampler needlework of a bird on a branch, Pegasus, basket of flowers, rocking horse, rocking elephant, plants, rooster, dog, sailboat, tree, house, and a bear, hence the double entendre name of the product. It was the first box of chocolates to come equipped with an index of all the varieties of the sampler printed under the lid. Early designs of the package had "Whitman's Sampler Chocolates & Confections Started in 1842" written on it. The Sampler's contents vary from box to box, but generally contain milk and dark chocolate-covered caramel, coconut, molasses chew, chocolate-covered peanuts, almonds, cashews, clusters, cherry cordial, maple fudge, chocolate-covered toffee, and nougaty chocolate whipped candies. Seasonal flavors like strawberry cream, pumpkin marshmallow, and mint chocolate patties are occasionally included. The candies' flavors can be determined by their shapes: a square shape denotes caramels; a rectangle means nougat filling; oval chocolates typically contain fudge; the soft-centered flavors, including cherry cordials, are round; and nut clusters are easily identified by their rough surfaces.