Fredric March began a career in banking but in 1920 found himself cast as an extra in films being produced in New York. He starred on the Broadway stage first in 1926 and would return there between screen appearances later on. He won plaudits (and an Academy Award nomination) for his send-up of John Barrymore in The Royal Family of Broadway. Four more Academy Award nominations would come his way, and he would win the Oscar for Best Actor twice: for Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and The Best Years of Our Lives. He could play roles varying from heavy drama to light comedy, and was often best portraying men in anguish, such as Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman. As his career advanced he progressed from leading man to character actor.
After he and his wife Florence Eldridge appeared in the heavily panned play, "Yr. Obedient Husband" in 1938, they ran an ad in New York newspapers; a cartoon borrowed from the New Yorker magazine, it showed a a trapeze artist missing his partner. The caption read: "Oops! Sorry!" His wife, the actress Florence Eldridge, appeared with him in The Studio Murder Mystery, Misérables, Les, Another Part of the Forest, Christopher Columbus, and Inherit the Wind. On TV, she appeared with him in the "Producers' Showcase" presentation of 'Dodsworth' on 30 April 1956. Children: Penelope ("Penny," b. 1932) and Anthony (b. 1934). His stage name was a shortened version of his mother's maiden name (Marcher). Won two Tony Awards as Best Actor (Dramatic), the first in 1947 for his performance in Ruth Gordon's "Years Ago," an award shared with José Ferrer for "Cyrano de Bergerac," and the second, ten years later, in 1957, for his landmark performance in Eugene O'Neill's "Long Day's Journey Into Night." He was also nominated in the same category in 1962 for Paddy Chayefsky's "Gideon." Proposed for possible blacklisting in 1949 by Californian branch of HUAC Shares the distinction with actors José Ferrer, Helen Hayes and Ingrid Bergman of being the first winners of acting Tony Awards when the annual event was established in 1947 For a while after undergoing surgery for prostate cancer in 1972 it seemed March's acting career was finished. However he was able to give one final great performance in The Iceman Cometh.