George Raft

American actor

Died when: 85 years 59 days (1021 months)
Star Sign: Libra

 

George Raft (born George Ranft;September 26, 1895 – November 24, 1980) was an American film actor and dancer identified with portrayals of gangsters in crime melodramas of the 1930s and 1940s.

A stylish leading man in dozens of movies, Raft is remembered for his gangster roles in Scarface (1932), Each Dawn I Die (1939) with James Cagney, and Billy Wilder's comedy Some Like It Hot (1959) with Marilyn Monroe and Jack Lemmon, as a dancer in Bolero (1934) with Carole Lombard, and a truck driver in They Drive by Night (1940) with Humphrey Bogart.

Raft said he never regarded himself as an actor. "I wanted to be me," he said.

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