Biography for
James Cagney

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Date of Birth

17 July 1899, New York, New York, USA

Date of Death

30 March 1986, Stanfordville, New York, USA (heart attack following illness from diabetes)

Birth Name

James Francis Cagney

Nickname

The Professional Againster

Height

5' 6½" (1.69 m)

Mini Biography

One of Hollywood's pre-eminent male stars of all time (eclipsed, perhaps, only by "King" Clark Gable and arguably by Gary Cooper or Spencer Tracy), and the cinema's quintessential "tough guy." Was also an accomplished if rather stiff hoofer and easily played light comedy. Ending three decades on the screen, retired to his farm in Stanfordville, New York (some 77 miles/124 km. north of his New York City birthplace), after starring in Billy Wilder's One, Two, Three (1961). Emerged from retirement to star in the 1981 screen adaptation of E.L. Doctorow's novel Ragtime (1981), in which he was reunited with his frequent co-star of the 30's, the actor 'Pat O'Brien', and which was his last theatrical film. (Ironically - or fittingly, if one prefers - it was O'Brien's last film as well.) Cagney's final performance came in the title role of the made-for-TV movie Terrible Joe Moran (1984) (TV), in which he played opposite Art Carney.

IMDb Mini Biography By: Bill Takacs

Spouse

Frances Cagney

(28 September 1922 - 30 March 1986) (his death) 2 children

Trade Mark

Famous for his gangster roles he played in the 1930s and 1940s (which made his only Oscar win as the musical composer/dancer/actor George M.Cohan most ironic).

Trivia

Cagney's first job as an entertainer was as a female dancer in a chorus line.

According to his authorized biography, Cagney, although of Irish and Norwegian extraction, could speak Yiddish since he had grown up in a heavily Jewish area in New York. He used to converse in Yiddish with Jewish performers like Sylvia Sidney.

Ranked #45 in Empire (UK) magazine's "The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time" list. [October 1997]

Brother of actor-producer William Cagney and of actress Jeanne Cagney.

Films co-starring James Cagney and 'Pat O'Brien (I)' were these nine: Here Comes the Navy (1934), Devil Dogs of the Air (1935), The Irish in Us (1935), Boy Meets Girl (1938), Angels with Dirty Faces (1938), Torrid Zone (1940), The Fighting 69th (1940), Ceiling Zero (1936), as well as their finale together, four decades later, Ragtime (1981).

American Film Institute Life Achievement Award [1974]

Interred at Gate of Heaven Cemetery, Hawthorne, New York, USA.

President of Screen Actors Guild (SAG). [1942-1944]

Convinced decorated war hero Audie Murphy to go into acting.

His widow Frances (nicknamed 'Bill') outlived Cagney by eight years, dying aged 95 in 1994.

Father of actor James Cagney Jr.

Pictured on a 33¢ USA commemorative postage stamp in the Legends of Hollywood series, issued 22 July 1999.

Had two adopted children, Casey and James Jr.

Was best friends with actors Pat O'Brien and Frank McHugh.

Earned a Black Belt in Judo.

He was voted the 14th Greatest Movie Star of all time by Entertainment Weekly.

Extraordinarily (for Hollywood), he never cheated on his wife Frances, resulting in a marriage that lasted 64 years (ending with his death). The closest he came was nearly giving into a seduction attempt by Merle Oberon while the two stars were on tour to entertain WWII GIs.

Despite the common perception that he was full-blooded Irish of origin this was not all-together true. His grandfather was from Norway, but as he told an interviewer shortly before his death in 1986: "My mother's father, my Grandpa Nelson, was a Norwegian sea captain, but when I tried to investigate those roots I didn't get very far, for he had apparently changed his name to another one that made it impossible to identify him within the rest of the population."

Was of Irish-Norwegian origin.

His electric acting style was a huge influence on future generations of actors. Actors as diverse as Clint Eastwood and Malcolm McDowell point to him as their number one influence to become actors.

Lived in a Gramercy Park building in New York City that was also occupied by Margaret Hamilton and now boasts Jimmy Fallon as one of its tennants.

Though most Cagney imitators use the line "You dirty rat!", Cagney never actually said it in any of his films.

According to James Cagney's autobiography Cagney By Cagney, (Published by Doubleday and Company Inc 1976, and ghost written by show biz biographer Jack McCabe), a Mafia plan to murder Cagney by dropping a several hundred pound klieg light on top of him was stopped at the insistence of George Raft. Cagney at that time was president of the Screen Actors Guild, and was determined not to let the mob infiltrate the industry. Raft used his many mob connections to cancel the hit.

He was voted the 11th Greatest Movie Star of all time by Premiere Magazine.

Named the #8 greatest Actor on The 50 Greatest Screen Legends List by The American Film Institute

According to his autobiography his brother Bill (who was also his manager) actively pursued the role of Cohan in the ultra-patriotic film Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) as a way of removing the taint of Cagney's radical activities in the 1930s, when he was a strong Roosevelt liberal. When Cohan himself learned about Cagney's background as a song-and-dance man in vaudeville, he okay-ed him for the project.

Lost the role of Knute Rockne to his friend Pat O'Brien when the administration of Notre Dame - which had approval over all aspects of the filming - nixed Cagney because of his support of the far-left (and anti-Catholic) Spanish Republic in the then-ongoing Spanish Civil War.

Originally a very left-wing Democrat activist during the 1930s, Cagney later switched his viewpoint and became progressively more conservative with age. He supported his friend Ronald Reagan's campaigns for the Governorship of California in 1966 and 1970, as well as his Presidential campaigns in 1980 and 1984. President Reagan delivered the eulogy at Cagney's funeral in 1986.

His performance as George M. Cohan in Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) is ranked #6 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Performances of All Time (2006).

His performance as Tom Powers in The Public Enemy (1931) is ranked #57 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time.

Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) is ranked #88 on the American Film Institute's 100 Most Inspiring Movies of All Time.

Often said that he did not understand the method actors like Marlon Brando. Cagney admitted that he used his own personal experiences to help create his performances and encouraged other actors to do so, but he did not understand actors who felt a need to go to the extreme length that method actors went to.

Biography in: "The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives". Volume Two, 1986- 1990, pages 149-152. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1999.

To protest the quality of scripts he was given at Warner Brothers, instead of violating his contract by refusing to appear in a picture he used his appearance to get even. In Jimmy the Gent (1934) he went and got an ugly crew-cut to make himself look like the hoodlum Warners wanted him to play. In movies like He Was Her Man (1934) he sported a thin mustache to upset thin-mustachioed studio boss Jack Warner.

Encouraged by his mother to take up boxing as a hobby. She thought it was a necessary skill to have, especially in the rough Eastside section of New York City where he grew up. She would often show up and watch him take on neighborhood kids in a street fight. However when he wanted to become a professional boxer, she disapproved. She started to put on a pair of boxing gloves and told him "If you want to become a professional fighter, then your first fight will have to be against me". He abandoned the idea of doing boxing professionally from that moment on.

Inspiration for the Madonna song, "White Heat", from her album, True Blue.

Turned down Stanley Holloway's role as Eliza's father in My Fair Lady (1964).

Turned down the lead role in The Al Jolson Story.

When filming the remake of "White Heat", special effects had not developed "squibs" yet. Special effects used low velocity bullets to break windows or to show bullets hitting near the characters. Special effects used marksmen. It ended up that Cagney was missed by mere inches in the factory scene.

Broke a rib while filming the dance scene in Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) but continued dancing until it was completed.

He once claimed that problems with Horst Buchholz had convinced him to retire from acting.

Awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Ronald Reagan at a ceremony at the White House on 26 March 1984.

Along with Rita Hayworth, is mentioned by name in the Tom Waits' song "Invitation To The Blues".

In his autobiography, he mentions when playing a chorus part in Pitter Patter, he earned $55 a week, of which he sent $40 a week back to his mother. As his salary increased, so did the amount he sent back home. While working on The Public Enemy, he earned $400 a week, sending over $300 back home. Until his mother passed, he never kept more than 50% of his earnings.

Often left the set early claiming he was too ill to continue filming in order to ensure an extra day of filming so that the extras and the film crew, whom he thought woefully underpaid, could get an additional day's salary.

Personal Quotes

There's not much to say about acting but this. Never settle back on your heels. Never relax. If you relax, the audience relaxes. And always mean everything you say.

All I try to do is to realise the man I'm playing fully, then put as much into my acting as I know how. To do it, I draw upon all that I've ever known, heard, seen or remember.

My biggest concern is that doing a rough-and-tumble scene I might hurt someone accidentally.

[In the early 1960's] "In this business you need enthusiasm. I don't have enthusiasm for acting anymore. Acting is not the beginning and end of everything."

They need you. Without you, they have an empty screen. So, when you get on there, just do what you think is right and stick with it.

Where I come from, if there's a buck to be made, you don't ask questions, you go ahead and make it.

With me, a career was the simple matter of putting groceries on the table.

Once a song and dance man, always a song and dance man. Those few words tell as much about me professionally as there is to tell.

I hate the word "superstar". I have never been able to think in those terms. They are overstatements. You don't hear them speak of Shakespeare as a superpoet. You don't hear them call Michelangelo a superpainter. They only apply the word to this mundane market.

You know, the period of World War I and the Roaring Twenties were really just about the same as today. You worked, and you made a living if you could, and you tried to make the best of things. For an actor or a dancer, it was no different then than today. It was a struggle.

My father was totally Irish, and so I went to Ireland once. I found it to be very much like New York, for it was a beautiful country, and both the women and men were good-looking.

"I'm sick of carrying guns and beating up women." (1931)

[about his most famous misquoted line:] "I never actually said, 'Nnng-you dirty ra-at!' What I actually said was [imitating Cary Grant]: 'Judy! Judy! Judy!'"

Learn your lines, find your mark, look 'em in the eye and tell 'em the truth.

What not many people know is that right up to two days before shooting started, I was going to play the good guy, the pal. Edward Woods played it in the end. - On The Public Enemy (1931)

Salary

The Roaring Twenties (1939)	$12,500/week
Angels with Dirty Faces (1938)	$150,000
Boy Meets Girl (1938)	$5,000/week
Something to Sing About (1937)	$100,000
Great Guy (1936)	$100,000
Hard to Handle (1933)	$3,000/week
Blonde Crazy (1931)	$450/week
The Public Enemy (1931)	$400/week
The Doorway to Hell (1930)	$400/week
Sinners' Holiday (1930)	$500/week (three-week shoot)

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