Gregory Ratoff, 1897-1960

Gregory Ratoff (l.) and Hugh Marlowe in All About Eve (1950)

Today marks the birth anniversary of actor/director Gregory Ratoff. Ratof was born in the Russian Empire and served in World War I. The Communist revolution and resulting civil war led Ratoff to emigrate first to Paris, and then to New York. He started acting in Hollywood in the early 1930s, playing ethnic roles. One of those early roles is as Mae West's attorney in I'm No Angel. Acting roles continued through the 1930s.

In the middle of the 1930s, Ratoff started directing, with one of his more well-known works being the English-language version of Intermezzo: A Love Story, the movie that brought Ingrid Bergman to Hollywood. He worked at Fox in the 1940s, making movies such as I Was an Adventuress and Where Do We Go From Here?.

But it would be 1950 that would bring Ratoff what would probably become his most famous role, as the theater producer Max Fabian who helped discover Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter) in the great backstage drama All About Eve.