WARNING: This Article May Contain Spoilers

Born: 9th December 1916

Died: 5th February 2020 (aged 103)

Issur Danielovitch was born one of seven children in Amsterdam, New York to Russian-Jewish immigrants Bryna and Herschel Danielovitch. As a child he worked many jobs to put food and drink on the table of his family as his father was an alcoholic who spent any money he earned on drink. He graduated from Amsterdam High School (where he got the acting bug) at the age of 18 with enough qualifications to go to University , though he did not have the money for the tuition, he showed the Dean his qualifications and, with the use of a loan and part time work, he was accepted and he graduated five years later with a Batchelor’s degree. He was accepted to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts on a scholarship where he met his first wife and mother of his oldest two sons, Michael and Joel. In 1941 Issur legally changed his name to Kirk Douglas before he joined the US Navy where he spent three years before being medically discharged for injuries he sustained from an early explosion of a depth charge. After the navy, Douglas returned to acting finding work as a radio actor and in radio commercials this led to theatrical work. His first film role came in 1946 in The Strange Love of Martha Ivers.   

If you think Kirk Douglas what film do you think of? No not Monty Python’s Life of Brian but the film that one pays homage to – Spartacus; although when you think about it Life of Brian pays homage to  only a very small part of this film but if you think of one you tend to think of the other (obviously only if you’ve seen them), yet there is more to Spartacus than that. Although this is a three hour film it definitely doesn’t feel like it, it flows well and Douglas is supported by a very strong cast. What I like about his portrayal is that his character runs the whole gamut of human emotion from vulnerable young man that has never known a woman to strong leader of an army of slaves and Douglas has the  strength to carry the weight of the role with little effort. The rest of his top five were made before Spartacus, which is a surprise considering he had almost half a century of film credits after it. OK I have to be honest I have read the book that his next film is based on, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne, and boy what a snoozefest! I think it’s one of the only books that I have never been able to finish (and I’ve started it at least three times!) but I quite enjoyed the adaptation – not a precise adaptation by any standards but what they did worked and I quite enjoyed Kirk Douglas’ portrayal of Ned Land, master harpooner. He is quite a whimsical character which is quite different from other roles I’ve seen him play and his portrayal fits within the film quite well. And, something I never knew about Douglas, he sings not perfectly but he can carry an adequate tune – don’t know if this was a natural talent or if he was coached for this film but it’s not bad. The only issue I have is that the fight scenes are a little ‘hammy’ but I’m not sure if they come across this way as it was a Disney film (and therefore a U* in British film classifications) or if Douglas wasn’t quite comfortable with these sorts of scenes but considering the other films on this list I would say it’s the former and Douglas struggled with the choreography as it was so simple and gentle. The third film on his list The Vikings where he plays Einar, son of Ragnar (which would be a physical impossibility if these two actors – Douglas and Ernest Borgnine – really were father and son as Borgnine is one month his junior!). Einar is young and impetuous, a typical Viking as far as this film is concerned and apart from Douglas not being that young (he was 40 when he made it) he does play him young and hot headed. Just thought it was a shame that the fight choreographer let him down – all the fight scenes are quite poor really considering the ‘swashbuckling’ films that preceded it. When I watched The Strange Love of Martha Ivers I totally got my maths wrong! At the start of the film, which was made in 1946, there is a young round faced boy, with glasses, called Walter O’Neil (Douglas’s character) and he is in it for about five minutes and I thought ‘Kirk Douglas really changed as he got older’ then, as the film continued, I realised that the boy wasn’t Kirk Douglas at all as he plays the older Walter – I hadn’t calculated that Douglas would have been 30 years old when he made this film (that’s what comes of having a 62 year career I guess – nobody realises how old you are!). For a debut film you can see that there is definitely a certain something about him; yes he’s a little awkward at times but that might be the script not his portrayal.  Finally we have Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, where Kirk plays Doc Holliday. Now considering Douglas was 41 when he made the film and the real Doc never saw this age himself its obviously not an accurate interpretation but for the film itself I don’t think that matters but it is a good role for Douglas himself – it shows his talent range quite well. The only thing I was slightly disappointed in was that there seems to be very little deterioration in his physical appearance considering Doc Holliday had Tuberculosis (Consumption). It is mentioned at the start of the film that his cough is getting worse yet he only coughs a couple of times throughout the film until the night before the gunfight – I would have expected a paling of the skin or something to show the disease getting hold on him – whether this was a directorial decision or the actor’s, I don’t know, but I found it disappointing

* Suitable for all. A U film should be suitable for audiences aged four years and over.

My favourite character of Kirk Douglas’ has to be from one of his later films – the 1986 film Tough Guys in which Douglas stars alongside his O. K. Corral co-star Burt Lancaster. Archie Long has just spent 30 years in prison and he, and his fellow train robber Harry Doyle, are released into a world that has totally passed them by. What I love is that even though the two characters are so out of place they are what the world needs polite, well-dressed men that have a sense of decency yet they are looked on as old and passed it – no wonder they decide to return to crime! Its nice to see Douglas play a more casual ‘tough guy’, this is after all an 80s film everything tinged with a touch of cheesy schmaltz! He’s at ease and his previous relationship with Lancaster is obvious. Considering he was 70 when he made this film it is obvious that to Douglas age is just a number (not many actors of his age would probably be happy to show their bare bottom on screen!) he is in very good shape, he always has been, yet gone is the sinewy physique from his early days as Spartacus he is well built his arms are muscular and he puts them on a display in the gym scene when he is picked up by the young Skye!

Kirk Douglas had a 62 year career in film and TV yet he never won any of the major acting awards however he did receive several awards for his longevity in the business! Kirk was married twice; his second wife, Anne Buydens, he met on the set of Act of Love. Kirk and Anne donated money to his old school and University (the latter of which also had a Kirk Douglas scholarship), they opened Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City as well as the Anne Douglas Centre for Homeless Women at the Los Angeles Mission. Douglas also donated several playgrounds in Jerusalem after reconnecting with his Jewish routes at the age of 74.

At the age of 79 Kirk Douglas had a stroke which left him with the inability to speak. After several months of speech therapy he was able to make a thank you speech at the Academy Awards ceremony when they presented him with an Honorary Award. Douglas passed away from natural causes at the age of 103 in February 2020, he was survived by his wife and three sons (Eric had died 16 years earlier of ‘acute intoxication’ from the combined effects of alcohol, tranquilizers, and painkillers). Kirk was buried alongside his son. Anne Douglas, aged 102, passed away a year after her husband and was buried alongside them both at the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery.