Eroll Flynn

 

Editor's Note:  I had no idea this guy was a total douchebag.

Errol Leslie Thomson Flynn was born in Tasmania, Australia on June 20, 1909.  His father was a biology professor at the University of Tasmania.  His mother came from a family of what Flynn called "seafaring folk," and it is from her that he developed a great love of the sea.

By age 9, Flynn was already a performer, working New Zealand's queen carnival circuit, a series of fundraising performances to support the war effort.  He continued acting while attending boarding school in London and would often work part-time jobs as well.  The first sign of trouble came when he was 18, when he was fired from his job as a shipping clerk for stealing the petty cash.  He'd spend the next five years seeking his fortune in tobacco.

Flynn's first film role came in 1933, when he starred in an Australian production titled In the Wake of the Bounty, a film based on the famous mutiny.  You can see the hour-long production here.  While not a huge financial success, the film did cement Flynn as an actor.  He followed it up with a less glamourous role, ok he was an extra, in the British production I Adore You.  While making this film, Flynn was simultaneously acting at the Northampton Repertory Company, but he was let go from the theatre after he threw a female stage manager down a flight of stairs.  Tell me again why this guy is so admired?

After he was fired, Flynn was cast in a Warner Brothers film produced in London titled Murder at Monte Carlo.  The movie is today considered to be a lost film, as no surviving prints have ever surfaced (check your closets, ladies!)  Although the film wasn't huge, the WB was so impressed by Flynn's performance that they sent him to Los Angeles and gave him a contract.

Flynn's first role in Hollywood was in the 1935 film The Case of the Curious Bride.  He appeared as two different minor characters.  Audiences hardly noticed either one.  His next film was a comedy called Don't Bet on Blondes, in which Flynn had a much bigger role.  That same year, Flynn was cast in the lead in Captain Blood, a pirate film based on a 1922 novel.  He was cast opposite Olivia de Haviland in the first of several films the two would share together.  It was a huge success for Warner Brothers and made household names of its stars.  They followed it up in 1936 with The Charge of the Light Brigade, which was even more successful than Captain Blood.

For the next few years, Flynn starred in a few forgettable films.  Then in 1938, he was cast in the title role in the film for which he is most famously associated, The Adventures of Robin Hood.  He was once again paired with de Haviland, given their track record of on-screen chemistry.  It was another success for the WB and was the sixth highest-grossing film of the year.  It was also the studio's first big-budget color film produced in Technicolor.  In 1995, the film was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry, deeming it "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."  

Flynn and de Haviland would team up again in future productions, including the comedy Four's a Crowd (1938) and the western Dodge City (1939).  While the latter was a huge success at the box office, the former is regarded as a flop.

In 1942, Flynn would receive headlines for a much darker reason.  Two 17-year-old girls who didn't know one another came forward just days apart, each claiming they'd been raped by Flynn, one in a Bel Air home, the other aboard Flynn's yacht.  His fans rushed to his defense and created a legal defense fund known as the American Boys Club for the Defense of Errol Flynn (ABCDEF).  One of the group's members was a 17-year-old high school student named William F. Buckley, Jr.  Yup, that one.  Flynn's lawyer accused both girls of having low morals and of being promiscuous.  True or not, Flynn was acquitted of all charges, though it impacted his ability to star in romantic leads.  At this point, his best films were behind him.

Flynn left Hollywood in the 1950s and relocated to Jamaica. Today he is credited with helping create the tourism industry there as he owned a successful hotel and popularized river trip vacations.

By 1959, Flynn was facing financial difficulties however, and in a bid to raise some quick cash, he flew from Los Angeles to Vancouver to negotiate the lease of his yacht.  While there, he complained of severe pain in his back and legs.  A local doctor attributed it to degenerative disc disease and spinal osteoarthritis, for which he administered 50 milligrams of Demerol.  It appeared to do the trick.  Flynn spent the next several hours entertaining his friends with stories of his life and career.  

Before heading to the airport to catch his flight home, Flynn retired for a quick nap.  Twenty minutes later, when his friends went to collect him, they found him unresponsive.  He was already dead when paramedics arrived.  He was only 50 years old.  The coroner would later attribute his death to a myocardial infarction due to coronary thrombosis as well as cirrhosis of the liver. 

Flynn's body took the train back to Los Angeles.

He was buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Cemetery in Glendale.

Location: Court of Freedom, The Garden of Everlasting Peace, 
Map #G30, Garden Crypt #5488
Inscription: In Memory of our Father From His Loving Children

Rest in peace.

Trivia

• Flynn released an autobiography called My Wicked, Wicked Ways: The Autobiography of Errol Flynn.  Pick up a copy from Amazon.  He also wrote a romance novel entitled Showdown.  It too is available at Amazon.
  
  
  
  
  
• Perhaps due to his love of the sea, Flynn often claimed to be a direct descendent of the mutineers of the HMS Bounty.  These claims are unsubstantiated however.
  
  
• As a teenager, Flynn attended Sydney Church of England Grammar School.  One of his classmates was the future Prime Minister of Australia, John Gorton.  Flynn didn't last long however, as he was expelled for theft.  
  
  
• In 1942, Flynn became an American citizen and attempted to enlist in the armed services.  He couldn't pass the physical however, due to a variety of ailments, including malaria, a heart murmur and several venereal diseases.  The media dubbed him a draft dodger, a claim he didn't refute, feeling the truth was more disgraceful.
  
  
• In a 2005 interview, Olivia de Haviland offered some inside information on the famous kissing scene in Robin Hood.  She said "and so we had one kissing scene, which I looked forward to with great delight.  I remember I blew every take, at least six in a row, maybe seven, maybe eight, and we had to kiss all over again.  And Errol Flynn got really rather uncomfortable, and he had, if I may say so, a little trouble with his tights."  The more you know.
  
  
• Northampton, England was home to an arthouse theatre named for Flynn that opened in 2013.  Six years later, his name was removed from the property, which was rebranded Northampton Filmhouse.  No explanation for the name change has been officially provided.
  
  
• Flynn's mansion was a peeping Tom's delight, with two-way mirrors in the guest rooms and peep holes in the bathrooms.  
  
  
• Flynn's son Sean served as a correspondent for Time Magazine during the Vietnam War.  In April 1970, he disappeared in Cambodia along with a colleague and neither man was ever seen again.  He was officially declared dead in 1984.