The Suicides of Ross Alexander

The name may elude you, but the young man it belonged to, Ross Alexander (Ross Alexander Smith, 1907-1937) was technically a leading man at the time of his untimely death, though he was more like a second lead in two of his better known films, A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1935), in which he played Demetrius, and Captain Blood (1935), in which he was Errol Flynn’s sidekick.

Alexander was raised mostly in Brooklyn, though his family moved to Rochester while he was in high school. He dropped out prior to graduation in order to be an actor, and he began getting work right away in regional stock and on Broadway. He seems to have been one of those “Tennis, anyone?” juveniles, chipper likeable chaps who wore ascots and fell in love with the wrong girls. He was only 13 the first time he was on Broadway in Enter Madame (1920-22). He was to return to the Broadway stage nearly a dozen times between 1926 and 1934. During that time he appeared in his first Hollywood movie The Wiser Sex (1932) for Paramount, in which he was sixth billed.

In early 1934, Alexander married Broadway actress Aleta Freel (1907-35), whose career was then about on par with Alexander’s. Henry Fonda was the best man. The pair went out to Hollywood, where Alexander immediately went to work on his new Warner Brothers contract. He proved popular, quickly his working way to second leads and co-leads. Early films include Maybe It’s Love (1935) with Gloria Stuart, and We’re in the Money (1935) with Joan Blondell and Glenda Farrell. Alexander’s success on A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Captain Blood, as well as reported affairs (he was secretly gay), proved too much for Freel, however. In spite of her Broadway credits, she was unable to get cast in Hollywood. Things had gotten even more tense as a result of Alexander’s love life. Following an argument one night in December 1935, Freel took her own life with a .22 rifle.

Alexander’s career proceeded apace. He continued to star in films throughout 1936: Boulder Dam, Brides Are Like That, I Married a Doctor, Hot Money, China Clipper, and Here Comes Carter. Those last couple also featured actress Anne Nagel(1915-1966), whom he married in September of that year.

Then, just three months later, Alexander took his own life with a .22 pistol. The reason, according to those who knew him, was money woes. Somehow his financial outlays had exceeded his income. It seems but a partial explanation. The reality is that his career was slowing down. Here Come Carter had come out in October. At the time of his death in January, 1937 he had but one movie in the can, the musical Ready, Willing and Able, in which he was fifth billed. So money was not coming in at the rate that it had, and the prospects for success he had been counting on were dimming, This, coupled with his personal problems, his closeted homosexuality, and surely some guilt feelings about Freel’s suicide seem to have combined to drive him to despair. At the time of his death, he was not yet 30.

Nagel went on to moderate success in W.C. Fields movies, a key role in The Green Hornet (both the radio and movie serial) and lots of B movie horror films. More on her in due course.