Dashing actor of Czech-Hungarian heritage, Cornel Wilde spent much of his youth in Europe, developing a Continental flair as well as an affinity for languages. He received a scholarship for medical school, but turned it down in favor of his new love, the theatre. A natural athlete and a champion fencer with the U.S. Olympic fencing team, he quit the team just prior to the 1936 Berlin Olympics in order to take a role in the theatre. He appeared in the Broadway hit "Having Wonderful Time", but it was not until he was hired in the dual capacities of fencing choreographer and actor ("Tybalt") in Laurence Olivier's 1940 Broadway production of "Romeo and Juliet" that Hollywood spotted him. He played a few minor roles before leaping to fame and an Oscar nomination as Frederic Chopin in A Song to Remember. He spent the balance of the 1940s in romantic (and often swashbuckling) leading roles. In the 1950s his star dimmed a little, and aside from an occasional blockbuster like The Greatest Show on Earth, he settled into adventure programmers. A growing interest in directing led him to form his own production company with the goal of directing his own films. Several of his ventures into film noir in this period, both his own and other directors', are quite interesting (The Big Combo, Storm Fear, for example). He produced, directed and starred in The Naked Prey, a tour-de-force adventure drama that brought him real acclaim as a director. His later films were of varying quality, and he ended his career in near-cameos in minor adventure films. He died of leukemia three days after his 74th birthday.