Cesar Romero

At 86 years old, Cesar Romero has this physical status:

Cesar Julio Romero Jr. (February 15, 1907 – January 1, 1994) was an American actor, singer, dancer, and singer.

For almost 60 years, he was involved in film, radio, and television. His diverse film roles included Latin lovers, historical figures in costume dramas, characters in light domestic comedies, and Joker on the Batman television series, which was included in TV Guide's 2013 list of the 60 Greatest Villains of All Time.

Early life

César Julio Romero Jr. was born in New York City on February 15, 1907, the son of César Julio Romero Sr. and Mara Mantilla. His mother is said to have been José Marta Marta, Cuba's national hero. His father was born in Barcelona and immigrated to the United States in 1888, where he worked as an import/export merchant. His mother was a concert pianist.

Romero grew up in Bradley Beach, New Jersey, and went to Bradley Beach Elementary School, Asbury Park High School, the Collegiate School, and the Riverdale Country Day School. Romero's Hollywood earnings enabled him to help his vast family, many of whom followed him to the American West Coast years later after his parents lost their sugar-import industry and suffered in the 1929 Wall Street crash. Romero, who referred to himself as "a Latin from Manhattan," lived with various family members for the remainder of his life.

He enlisted in the United States Coast Guard as an apprentice seaman on October 12, 1942 and spent in the Pacific Theater of Operations. In November 1943, he appeared aboard a Coast Guard-crewed assault transport USS Cavalier. Romero was involved in the Tinian and Saipan invasions, according to a press release from the time. He preferred to be a regular member of the crew, according to the same article, and was eventually promoted to the rank of chief boatswain's mate.

Personal life

Romero never married and had no children, but he appeared at Hollywood functions as an escorting actor, including Joan Crawford, Linda Darnell, Barbara Stanwyck, Lucille Ball, Ann Sheridan, Jane Wyman, and Ginger Rogers; he was almost always described as a "confirmed bachelor" in interviews and publications. Many scholars and biographers have speculated over Romero's sexuality having been stifled. Boze Hadleigh wrote a collection of alleged interviews with Romero in Hadleigh's 1996 book Hollywood Gays, in which Romero reportedly came out; many of the claimed interviews in Hollywood Gays have been questioned as potential forgeries, and Romero died two years before the book was published.

According to reports, Charlie Harper, the lead singer of English punk band UK Subs, is a nephew of Romero.

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Career in film

The 6'3" [190 cm] Romero routinely played "Latin lovers" in films from the 1930s until the 1950s, usually in supporting roles. In 1935, Romero played a leading role The Devil is a Woman opposite Marlene Dietrich. Romero starred as the Cisco Kid in six westerns made between 1939 and 1941. Romero danced and performed comedy in the 20th Century Fox films he starred in opposite Carmen Miranda and Betty Grable, such as Week-End in Havana and Springtime in the Rockies, in the 1940s. He also played a minor role as Sinjin, a piano player in Glenn Miller's band, in the 1942 20th Century Fox musical Orchestra Wives.

In The Thin Man (1934), Romero played a villainous supporting role opposite the film's main stars William Powell and Myrna Loy. Many of Romero's films from this early period saw him cast in small character parts, such as Italian gangsters and East Indian princes. Romero had a lead role as the Pathan rebel leader, Khoda Khan, in John Ford's British Raj-era action film Wee Willie Winkie (1937) starring Shirley Temple and Victor McLaglen and The Little Princess (1939) also with Temple. He also appeared in a comic turn as a foil for Frank Sinatra and his crew in Ocean's 11 (1960) starring the Rat Pack (Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop).

Romero sometimes played the leading man, for example in Allan Dwan's 15 Maiden Lane (1936) opposite Claire Trevor, as well as winning the key role of the Doc Holliday character (with name changed to "Doc Halliday") in Dwan's Wyatt Earp saga Frontier Marshal (1939) starring Randolph Scott and Nancy Kelly three years later. 20th Century Fox, along with mogul Darryl Zanuck, selected Romero to co-star with Tyrone Power in the Technicolor historical epic Captain from Castile (1947), directed by Henry King. While Power played a fictionalized character, Romero played Hernán Cortés, a historical conquistador in Spain's conquest of the Americas.

Among almost countless television credits, Romero appeared several times on The Martha Raye Show in the mid-1950s. He portrayed Don Diego de la Vega's maternal uncle in a number of Season 2 Zorro episodes.

In 1958, he guest-starred as Ramon Valdez in How to Marry a Millionaire in the episode entitled "The Big Order". He performed the mambo with Gisele MacKenzie on her NBC variety show, The Gisele MacKenzie Show. He guest-starred in 1957 on CBS's The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour on the first episode of the seventh season ("Lucy Takes a Cruise to Havana"). He played "Don Carlos", a Card sharp on the episode, "The Honorable Don Charlie Story" of NBC's Wagon Train. On January 16, 1958, he appeared on The Ford Show, Starring Tennessee Ernie Ford. In 1959, Romero was cast as Joaquin in the episode "Caballero" from The Texan, and on September 26 of that year, he hosted the Cuban installment of John Gunther's High Road.

In 1960, he was cast as Ricky Valenti in "Crime of Passion" from Pete and Gladys. In 1965, Romero played the head of THRUSH in France in "The Never Never Affair" from The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

From 1966 to 1968, he portrayed the Joker on Batman. He refused to shave his moustache for the role, and so the supervillain's white face makeup was simply smeared over it throughout the series' run and in the 1966 film.

His guest star work in the 1970s included a recurring role on the western comedy Alias Smith and Jones as Señor Armendariz, a Mexican rancher feuding with Patrick McCreedy (Burl Ives), the owner of a ranch on the opposite side of the border. He appeared in three episodes. Romero later portrayed Peter Stavros on Falcon Crest (from 1985 to 1987). He also appeared in a sixth-season episode of The Golden Girls, where he played a suitor named Tony Delvecchio for Sophia. Apart from these television roles, Romero appeared as A.J. Arno, a small-time criminal who continually opposes Dexter Riley (played by Kurt Russell) and his schoolmates of Medfield College in a series of films by Walt Disney Productions in the 1970s.

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