Day: November 18, 2009

Series 2 of the Hugh Morton finding aid is now available online! Visit the finding aid here to check out the addition of People and Events, late 1920s-early 2000s (bulk 1940s-1990s).

To see photos from Series 2 online through the Hugh Morton Collection of Photographs and Films, click here.

More information on the addition is available through our sister blog, A View to Hugh.

“Robert Williams was one of the most realistic comedians the screen had. He made Cary Grant look like he was overacting…. To watch Robert Williams act was like seeing a comic using the Method, long before the Method became famous with Marlon [Brando] and Monty [Clift].”

–From a Turner Classic Movies interview with actor Christopher Plummer (2008)

“Williams … had a one-of-a-kind way of speaking a line — breezy and distracted, yet focused. An unmistakeable original, Williams is one of film history’s regrets. After a handful of talkies and this one starring role [opposite Jean Harlow in “Platinum Blonde”], he died of a ruptured appendix at age 34.”

–From “Dangerous Men: Pre-Code Hollywood and the Birth of the Modern Man” (2002) by Mick LaSalle

“If he had lived, he almost surely would have become a major star.”

–From “The Films of Frank Capra” (1974) by Donald C. Willis

Robert Williams was born in 1897 near Morgantown in Carteret County and grew up on a farm. He ran away from home at age 11 to join a tent show.