Basil Rathbone Net Worth

#Fact1He had a good friend, Jack Miltern, who also loved Rathbone's wife Ouida. The three of them lived together in a cottage, until Miltern died, killed by a hit and run driver.2When WW2 was declared in 1939, he wrote to the British War Office to enlist, he wanted to fight. But he received a letter which explained to him that he was too old to fight.3Is one of 13 actors who have received an Academy Award nomination for his portrayal of a real-life king. The others in chronological order are Charles Laughton for The Private Life of Henry VIII. (1933), Robert Morley for Marie Antoinette (1938), Laurence Olivier for Henry V (1944) and Richard III (1955), José Ferrer for Joan of Arc (1948), Yul Brynner for The King and I (1956), John Gielgud for Becket (1964), Peter O'Toole for Becket (1964) and The Lion in Winter (1968), Robert Shaw for A Man for All Seasons (1966), Richard Burton for Anne of the Thousand Days (1969), Kenneth Branagh for Henry V (1989), Nigel Hawthorne for The Madness of King George (1994), and Colin Firth for The King's Speech (2010).4Had appeared with John Carradine in seven films: The Garden of Allah (1936), The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939), Casanova's Big Night (1954), The Court Jester (1955), The Black Sleep (1956), The Last Hurrah (1958) and Hillbillys in a Haunted House (1967).5He has two roles in common with Tom Baker: (1) Rathbone played Sir Guy of Gisbourne in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) while Baker played him in The Zany Adventures of Robin Hood (1984) and (2) Rathbone played Sherlock Holmes in 14 films from The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939) to Dressed to Kill (1946) and Baker played him in The Hound of the Baskervilles (1982).6The Rathbones were a Hollywood exception in that they remained a happily married couple for more than four decades. During their heyday in Hollywood, they were known to host the most lavish epicurean parties. For many years, they (and their six dogs) lived in a house in the Los Feliz Hills, overlooking Hollywood, which had once been owned by the prizefighter Jack Dempsey and his wife, the actress Estelle Taylor.7He was the favorite choice of Gone with the Wind (1939) author Margaret Mitchell to play the role of Rhett Butler.8Rathbone was a firm believer in ESP. When he was four, his parents booked passage on a ship taking them from South Africa to Britain. His mother had a dream that the ship would sink in the bay of Biscay and convinced her husband that they she take a later boat. She was proved prescient when the ship did sink with a loss of all hands.9Distant relative of Julian Rathbone.10The Sherlock Holmes-esque Basil of Baker Street in The Great Mouse Detective (1986) is named after Rathbone who was perhaps best known for the many times he played Sherlock Holmes.11British Army Fencing Champion.12Was related by marriage to the famous Huxley family. His wife's niece, Ouida Branch, whom they brought up from an early age, married David Bruce Huxley, the brother of famed writers Aldous Huxley and Julian Huxley and Nobel Prize-winning scientist Andrew Huxley.13He never renounced his British citizenship and was a lifelong member of the Conservative party.14He was awarded 3 Stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame: for Motion Pictures at 6549 Hollywood Boulevard; for Radio at 6300 Hollywood Boulevard; and for Television at 6915 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California.15Although earlier in his career, he had quit playing Sherlock Holmes out of disgust at what he thought was typecasting, later in life he began appearing as Holmes on television and in several movies, and even wrote (along with his wife) a play about Holmes, in which he played the character on stage. That this represented a change of heart seems unlikely though, as until his death, he expressed hostility to his identification as Sherlock. It probably can be explained by Rathbone's chronic lack of money and a need to exploit his previous fame.16He campaigned in vain for the role of Lord Henry Wotton in the film adaptation of Oscar Wilde's novel The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945). He believed that his typecasting as Sherlock Holmes cost him the role, and was a contributing factor in his leaving the Universal series.17He is considered the greatest swordsman in Hollywood history, superior even to on-screen foes Errol Flynn and Tyrone Power. However, because he was so frequently cast as the villain, he won only two on-screen duels in his career - as Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet (1936), for which he earned an Oscar nomination, and as Captain Esteban Pascuale against the friar (Eugene Pallette), who was so outclassed by "the Capitan" he was harmlessly disarmed in a matter of seconds, in The Mark of Zorro (1940). His last, filmed when the actor was 63, was with Danny Kaye in The Court Jester (1955). It is considered by some the best sword fight ever filmed.18His final appearance as Sherlock Holmes was in a play written by his wife Ouida Bergère, appropriately titled "Sherlock Holmes". The production opened on Broadway on October 30, 1953, and lasted only three performances.19Fought in the British Army during World War I, and was awarded the Military Cross for bravery under fire.20Although he has been immortalized as a screen villain, before he played Murdstone in 1935, he had never played a villain and he was known, both on film and stage, exclusively as a matinée idol and romantic leading man.21Was so frequently typecast as a villain that he literally jumped at the first few opportunities he ever got to play Sherlock Holmes because "for once, I got to beat the bad guy instead of play him". Indeed, he played the legendary heroic detective more than any other character in his career. However, by 1946, he had become so sick of the role that he quit his Sherlock Holmes film series and temporarily returned to the Broadway stage. Over the course of his career, he had played the super sleuth in 16 films and over 200 radio plays.22Won Broadway's 1948 Tony Award as Best Actor (Dramatic) for his performance as Dr. Sloper in the original Broadway production of "The Heiress". The award was shared with Henry Fonda for "Mister Roberts" and Paul Kelly for "Command Decision".23Cousin of actor/manager Sir Frank R. Benson.24Following his death, he was interred at Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York.25Had portrayed the title character on Blue (1939-1942) and Mutual (1943-1946) Radio's "The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes".26Distant cousin of Major Henry Rathbone, who was part of President Abraham Lincoln's theater party the night Lincoln was assassinated. Major Rathbone himself was stabbed by John Wilkes Booth as the latter was escaping, but the wound was not fatal. Major Rathbone later married Clara Harris, who was also in the Lincoln party, but he murdered her in an insane rage in 1875 and spent the rest of his life in an insane asylum. He had suffered from what would now be characterized as a form of PTSD ever since the assassination.27Nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar twice, and lost both times to the very same actor, Walter Brennan.28Had one daughter with Ouida Bergère: Cynthia Rathbone (1939-1969).29Had one son with Ethel Marion Foreman: John Rodion.