Raymond Burr facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Raymond Burr
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Burr in 1968
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| Born |
Raymond William Stacy Burr
May 21, 1917 New Westminster, British Columbia, Canada
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| Died | September 12, 1993 (aged 76) Healdsburg, California, U.S.
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| Resting place | Fraser Cemetery |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1934–1993 |
| Spouse(s) |
Isabella Ward
(m. 1948; div. 1952) |
| Partner(s) | Robert Benevides (1960–1993) |
Raymond William Stacy Burr (May 21, 1917 – September 12, 1993) was a famous Canadian actor. He was well-known for his many roles in Hollywood movies and for starring in popular TV shows. His most famous roles were as the lawyer Perry Mason and the detective Ironside.
Burr started acting early in his career, appearing on stage, radio, TV, and in movies. He often played the "bad guy" in films. One of his most famous movie roles was in the Alfred Hitchcock thriller Rear Window (1954). He also appeared in the monster movie Godzilla, King of the Monsters! (1956) and its sequel Godzilla 1985. Raymond Burr won Emmy Awards in 1959 and 1961 for playing Perry Mason. He played this character for nine seasons (1957–1966) and later in 26 TV movies (1985–1993). His second big TV series, Ironside, also earned him many awards nominations.
Raymond Burr passed away in 1993 from cancer. He was ranked among the 50 Greatest TV Stars of All Time by TV Guide magazine in 1996.
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Early Life of Raymond Burr
Raymond William Stacy Burr was born on May 21, 1917, in New Westminster, British Columbia, Canada. His father, William Johnston Burr, sold hardware, and his mother, Minerva Annette, was a pianist and music teacher.
When Raymond was six, his parents divorced. His mother moved to Vallejo, California, with Raymond and his younger siblings, Geraldine and James. Raymond went to Berkeley High School.
As a teenager, he worked on a ranch in New Mexico for a year. He also joined the Civilian Conservation Corps, a program that helped young people find work during the Great Depression. He started acting on stage at age 12 with a theater group in Vancouver.
Raymond Burr's Theatre Career
Raymond Burr wanted to study acting at the Pasadena Playhouse, but he couldn't afford it. He joined a theater group in Toronto in 1934 that traveled across Canada. He also toured with another group in India, Australia, and England.
In 1937, Burr began working with the Pasadena Playhouse. He moved to New York in 1940 and appeared in his first Broadway show, Crazy With the Heat. His first main role on stage was in 1942 in a Pasadena Playhouse show called Quiet Wedding. He taught drama there for 18 months and acted in about 30 plays. His role in the Broadway play The Duke in Darkness (1944) led to a contract with RKO Radio Pictures.
Raymond Burr in Films
Between 1946 and 1957, Raymond Burr acted in over 50 movies. He often played villains, which made him famous in film noir movies. Film experts say his most important work in this type of film includes Desperate (1947), Raw Deal (1948), and Crime of Passion (1957).
He was good at showing the complex sides of his characters, even when they were doing bad things. He made audiences feel some sympathy for them. His villain roles were also seen in Westerns, historical dramas, and horror films.
Sometimes, Burr played characters on the right side of the law. He played a strong prosecutor in A Place in the Sun (1951). His performance in that courtroom scene impressed the producers of the TV series Perry Mason. They thought of him for the role of the district attorney, Hamilton Burger.
Raymond Burr's Radio Work
Raymond Burr started acting in radio dramas in San Francisco when he was just 12 years old.
Because of his larger size, it was sometimes hard for him to get on-screen roles. But on radio, his amazing voice was perfect. He played both romantic heroes and scary villains. He earned a good living from radio acting.
Burr worked steadily in radio from the 1940s. He had regular roles in shows like Pat Novak for Hire (1949) and Dragnet (1949–50). He also appeared in other popular shows such as Suspense and Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar.
In 1956, Burr starred in the CBS Radio Western drama Fort Laramie. He played Captain Lee Quince, a cavalry officer. The show was very popular, and Burr received many fan letters. However, when CBS asked him to star in the TV series Perry Mason, the radio show had to end because of his busy schedule.
Raymond Burr was known for being loyal to his colleagues. He often hired other radio actors to appear on his TV shows, like Perry Mason.
Raymond Burr on Television
In the 1950s, Raymond Burr became a very busy TV actor. He first appeared on television in 1951 in shows like Stars Over Hollywood and the first episode of Dragnet. He also appeared in Four Star Playhouse and Playhouse 90.
Starring in Perry Mason
In 1956, Burr tried out for the role of Perry Mason in a new CBS-TV show. This show was based on the popular detective novels by Erle Stanley Gardner. The producers were very impressed with Burr. The author, Erle Stanley Gardner, reportedly pointed at the screen during Burr's audition and said, "That's Perry Mason!"
The show ran from 1957 to 1966 and made Burr a huge star. In the early 1960s, about 30 million people watched the show every Saturday night. Burr received thousands of fan letters each week. He won two Emmy Awards for his role as Perry Mason in 1959 and 1961. The series is still shown in reruns today.
The show also starred Barbara Hale as Della Street (Mason's secretary), William Talman as Hamilton Burger (the district attorney), and Ray Collins as Lieutenant Arthur Tragg (a homicide detective).
Starring in Ironside
After Perry Mason ended, Raymond Burr moved to Universal Studios. There, he starred in another TV drama called Ironside, which aired on NBC from 1967 to 1975.
In the first episode, his character, San Francisco Chief of Detectives Robert T. Ironside, is paralyzed and uses a wheelchair. This was one of the first crime shows to feature a police officer with a disability. The show earned Burr many Emmy and Golden Globe nominations.
Other TV Series and Films
After Ironside, Burr tried other TV series, but they were not as successful. He starred in Kingston: Confidential (1977) as a newspaper owner who solved crimes. He also hosted the TV special that later became the popular series Unsolved Mysteries in 1987.
In 1985, Burr was asked to play Perry Mason again in a TV movie called Perry Mason Returns. He also returned to his role as Steve Martin in the movie Godzilla 1985. He agreed to do the Perry Mason movie if Barbara Hale also returned as Della Street. The movie was very popular, and Burr went on to make 26 more Perry Mason TV films before he passed away.
By 1993, Raymond Burr was using a wheelchair because of his health. In his last Perry Mason movie, The Case of the Killer Kiss, he was mostly shown sitting or leaning on a table. He also made an Ironside reunion movie in 1993, bringing back the original cast.
Raymond Burr's Personal Life
Raymond Burr was known for his larger size throughout his life. He said that when he was a child, his weight sometimes caused him problems.
Burr was briefly married to actress Isabella Ward in 1948. The marriage ended within months, and they divorced in 1952.
In 1960, Burr met Robert Benevides, who was also an actor. Benevides later became a production consultant for many of the Perry Mason TV movies. They shared many hobbies and businesses together, including an orchid nursery and a vineyard in California.
Hobbies and Businesses
Raymond Burr had many interests. He loved growing orchids, collecting wine, art, stamps, and seashells. He also enjoyed cooking, flying, sailing, and fishing. He was a big reader and had a great memory. He was one of the first people to bring Portuguese water dogs to the United States and breed them.
His love for orchids grew into a business with Robert Benevides called Sea God Nurseries. They had nurseries in places like Fiji, Hawaii, and California. They created over 1,500 new types of orchids. Burr even named one orchid the "Barbara Hale Orchid" after his Perry Mason co-star. They also grew grapes for wine at their farm in California.
In 1965, Burr bought Naitauba, a large island in Fiji, which was full of seashells. He planned to retire there, but health problems made it impossible, and he sold the island in 1983.
Helping Others
Raymond Burr was a very generous person. He gave a lot of money to charity, including his earnings from the Perry Mason movies. He also helped his friends financially. He supported 26 foster children through organizations like the Foster Parents' Plan. He also gave money and some of his Perry Mason scripts to the McGeorge School of Law in California.
Burr was an early supporter of the Bailey-Matthews National Shell Museum in Sanibel, Florida. He helped raise money and donated a large collection of seashells from his island in Fiji.
In 1993, Sonoma State University and the University of Colorado gave him honorary doctorates for his acting and support of education. Burr also started a foundation to fund academic research, including creating a dictionary of the Fijian language.
He made many trips with the United Service Organizations (USO) to entertain troops. He visited soldiers in Korea and Vietnam during wartime. He often organized his own shows and visited smaller military bases that the USO didn't usually reach, like those in Greenland.
Raymond Burr was known in Hollywood as a kind and generous man. His co-star, Ray Collins, once said that Burr was always there to help if anyone on the Perry Mason set had a problem.
Illness and Death
While filming his last Perry Mason movie in 1993, Raymond Burr became very ill. Doctors found that cancer had spread in his body and could not be treated. Burr held several "goodbye parties" before he passed away on September 12, 1993, at his ranch in California. He was 76 years old.
After his death, the President of the American Bar Association said that Raymond Burr's portrayal of Perry Mason showed lawyers in a very professional way. A poll by The National Law Journal even named Perry Mason as the second most admired attorney, real or fictional.
Raymond Burr was buried with his parents in Fraser Cemetery in New Westminster, British Columbia. A memorial service was held for him at the Pasadena Playhouse.
Awards and Honors
For his role in Perry Mason, Raymond Burr won the Emmy Award for Best Actor in a Drama Series in 1959 and 1961. He was also named Favorite Male Performer by TV Guide magazine in 1960 and 1961.
In 1960, Burr received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He also received six Emmy nominations for his work in Ironside. The Thomas M. Cooley Law School created the Raymond Burr Award for Excellence in Criminal Law in his honor.
In 1996, TV Guide ranked Raymond Burr as #44 on its list of the 50 Greatest TV Stars of All Time. A garden at the Bailey-Matthews National Shell Museum in Florida was named in his honor because of his help in starting the museum.
From 2000 to 2006, a theater in New Westminster, Canada, was renamed the Raymond Burr Performing Arts Centre. In 2008, Canada Post issued a postage stamp featuring Burr as part of its "Canadians in Hollywood" series. He also received the Canadian Legends Award and a star on Canada's Walk of Fame in 2009.
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