Zachary Scott

His daughter, Waverly Elaine Scott, was born January 24, 1936. Although Hollyood publicists wrote that she had been named after the novel, she was in fact named after her maternal grandfather. If she had been a boy, Scott had planned on naming him Zachary Thomson Scott III.

Although he continued to work in films, including one for director Luis Buñuel, Scott never quite reclaimed the level of stardom that he'd achieved in the mid-1940s.

His daughter, Shelley, was born in 1941. He adopted her when he married her mother, Ruth Ford.

American leading man of suave or sinister roles. A collateral relative of George Washington and William Barclay 'Bat' Masterson, Scott was the son of a wealthy surgeon. Intending to follow his father into medicine, Scott studied at the University of Texas, but found he preferred the theater. He dropped out of college and signed on as a cabin boy on a freighter bound for England. There he found work in provincial repertory, gaining confidence and skill. Returning to Texas, he married actress Elaine Anderson and became active in local theater in Austin. He and his wife were spotted in a play there by Alfred Lunt, who recommended them to the producers of New York's Theatre Guild. Thus, Scott made a successful entry into the Broadway stage, appearing in several successes. In one of them he was noticed by Jack L. Warner, who signed him to a film contract and introduced him to film audiences in the title role of The Mask of Dimitrios (1944). He was well received in the part of the mysterious and debonair scoundrel and seemed destined for a top-level career in movies.

Indeed, a subsequent role as the cad in Mildred Pierce (1945) seemed likely to cement him as both a star and as a typecast portrayer of amoral characters.

Jean Renoir, however, cast the Texan in a touching and sensitive role in his classic The Southerner (1945). Though he received great acclaim for his performance, Scott was not particularly well promoted by Warners, and his subsequent films declined in prestige.

Zachary Scott and his co-star, Ann Sheridan, in The Unfaithful (1947) were both born in Texas and died two years apart at the age of 51 (of a brain tumor and cancer, respectively).

First wife actress Elaine Anderson filed for divorce citing mental cruelty in November of 1949, but it was widely suggested she had fallen in love with author John Steinbeck. She and Steinbeck married in December of 1950, only months after the divorce was final.

In 1950, a divorce and a rafting accident, in which he was badly injured, sent him into a depression. Subsequently, he married actress Ruth Ford and began to concentrate more on stage and television work.

In 1951 he was arrested at a bar in Louisiana for violating segregation laws. He was in a black establishment drinking alcohol with African-Americans. he protested in court that he was invited to the bar by black men in uniform and that he was proud to drink with US soldiers.

He filed papers to adopt his daughter, Shelley, on Feb. 9, 1953. The adoption was finalized later that year.

His grandson, David Melville Skinner, was born on January 6, 1957.

He was arrested in the summer of 1961 in Hawaii for public intoxication. He was doing a hula dance outside a bar when he was arrested.

The oldest continuously operating theatre in Texas, also one of ten original resident theatre companies in America, was renamed the Zachary Scott Theatre in 1968 in honor of the Austin-born actor. In the early 1990's, the theatre moved to professional status with Actor's Equity Association and was selected for a National Endowment for the Arts Advancement Grant.

His mother, Sally Lee Scott, died November 1983 at 95. She left everything to be divided by her 3 children. Zachary Scott's two daughters split their late father's share. his widow, Ruth, tried to sue for a share of it for herself, but didn't have enough money for a lawyer.