John Uhler Lemmon III was born in a hospital elevator on February 8th 1925, in Boston, Massachusetts. Beautiful and adorable, he was an only child after his mother insisted she would not go through child birth again after she was unable to reach the ward! His parents were Mildred, an infamous party girl who dreamed of stardom, and John, the owner of the Doughnut Corporation of America. At the tender age of 4, Jack (a name that has always been with him, according to his mother!) made his stage debut in There’s Gold In Them Thar Hills. And by the age of 8, Jack became hooked on dramatics and dreamed of becoming a professional actor.
He briefly served as an ensign in WWII before moving to New York at the age of 18. After graduating from the notoriously difficult Harvard University, he studied drama under the supervision of legendary teacher Uta Hagen. Jack went on to star in a number of stage shows as well as appearing on radio soap operas, providing voices for both comedy and drama pieces.
In 1947, at the age of 22, Jack made his television debut. He made over 500 live television performances in just under 5 years, with the majority of the work being slapstick comedy. Jack made a brief appearance in movies, for the first time, as a plasterer in The Lady Takes a Sailor (1949) starring Jane Wyman, though the part was very brief. At the same time, he was the leading star in two American sitcoms called That Wonderful Guy and Heaven for Betsy, where he met pretty blonde comedy actress Cynthia Stone. The two began dating in 1948, were married on May 7th 1950 and had a son Chris on June 22nd 1953. Jack’s career was also going from strength to strength.
In 1952, 27-year-old Jack secured a contract at Columbia Pictures and starred opposite Judy Holliday as her boyfriend in the hit romantic comedy, It Should Happen to You (1954). The film was a big hit and critics were impressed by what they saw of young Jack. He was destined for big things right
from that first debut movie as the audience fell in love with him immediately.
With film work now coming in, Jack next starred in the quirky comedy Phffft! (1954) and the Betty Grable musical Three For The Show (1955). He then landed the part of ladies’ man Ensign Pulver in the wartime comedy drama Mister Roberts (1955), in which he won an Oscar award for Best Supporting Actor (a record, being as the film was only Jack’s fifth movie in his career!).
Unfortunately though, at this point, his marriage to Cynthia had crumbled to nothing as they had drifted apart. They had been through many rows, mainly regarding Jack’s continuous absence from home due to work commitments. Jack moved out of their house in LA and wanted to take little Chris with him but Cynthia won full custody – Jack was to have Chris every other weekend he was available. Jack moved into a bachelor pad in Brentwood, California as he filmed Fire Down Below (1957) with troubled actress Rita Hayworth in Trinidad. During the filming of this movie, their divorce was finalised in October 1956.
That year he also starred in the wacky war service comedy Operation Mad Ball (1957) – which won the attention of a director named Billy Wilder. Now making $80,000 a picture, Jack was filming Bell Book and Candle (1958) with Kim Novak when Billy sent him the script to a cross-dressing comedy called Some Like It Hot (1959). Jack immediately accepted the part after laughing uncontrollably at the excellent comedy script.
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