Clark Gable

At 59 years old, Clark Gable has this physical status:

William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901 – November 16, 1960) was an American film actor often referred to as "The King of Hollywood."

In a career that spanned decades, he played roles in more than 60 motion pictures in a variety of genres, three decades of which were as a leading man.

Gable died of a heart attack in his last on-screen appearance, which was of an elderly cowboy from The Misfits, which was released posthumously in 1961. Born and raised in Ohio, Gable began his film career as an extra in Hollywood silent films from 1924 to 1926.

He progressed to supporting roles in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's 1931 production of Dance, Fools, Dance was with Joan Crawford, who requested him to act.

His next film role, along with reigning sex symbol Jean Harlow, made him MGM's top male actor.

It Happened One Night (1934), co-starring Claudette Colbert, was named Best Actor by Frank Capra for Frank Capra's It Happened One Night (1934).

He was nominated for the same award in Mutiny (1935) and Gone with the Wind (1939), as Rhett Butler opposite Scarlett O'Hara.

With Manhattan Melodrama (1934), Saratoga (1937), Test Pilot (1938), and Boom Town (1940), three of which co-starred Spencer Tracy, he found continued commercial and critical success. Gable appeared opposite some of the most well-known actors of their day.

Joan Crawford was a favorite actor of his time and he appeared in eight films with her.

Myrna Loy has worked with him seven times, and he has appeared with Jean Harlow in six productions.

He appeared in four films and three with Norma Shearer and Ava Gardner. During World War II, Gable served as an aerial cameraman and bomber gunman in Europe.

Although his films following his return were not critically lauded, they did a good job at the box office.

With The Hucksters (1947), Homecoming (1948), and Mogambo (1953), which also featured newcomer Grace Kelly, he had a critical revival.

Later on, he appeared in westerns and war films, including Run Silent, Run Deep (1958) with Burt Lancaster, as well as in comedies starring a new generation of leading ladies, such as Doris Day in Teachers' Pet (1959) and Marilyn Monroe in The Misfits (1961). Gable was one of the most consistent box-office performers in history, appearing on Quigley Publishing's annual Top Ten Money Making Stars Poll 16 times.

The American Film Institute named him as the seventh best male actor of classic American cinema.

Personal life

At the Beverly Hills Lodge No. 3, Gable was initiated into Freemasonry in 1933. California, 528 people.

A gable couple was able to marry. When he lived in Astoria, Oregon, he was engaged to actress Franz Dorfler. Josephine Dillon, the woman who would be his acting coach and boss, referred him to her. In 1924, Gable and Dillon married in 1924 and divorced in 1930. "He owed her a debt of gratitude" for the Dillon-based instruction in the early years of his career, Gable would say. Maria Franklin Prentiss Lucas Langham, a Texas socialite (nicknamed "Ria"), was his second wife (nicknamed "Ria"). In 1939, the couple divorced. Carole Lombard, a 201-201 who died in a plane crash less than three years later, was only 13 days later during a film break on Gone with the Wind.

In 1949, Gable married Sylvia Ashley, a British model and actress who was widow of Douglas Fairbanks; the couple divorced in 1952.

Gable married Kay Spreckels (née Kathleen Williams), a thrice-married former fashion model and actress who had previously been married to sugar-refining heir Adolph B. Spreckels, Jr., in 1955, making her second stepfather to her two children. Kay Gable gave birth to John Clark Gable, Gable's only son, on March 20, 1961, in the same hospital in which her husband died four months before. Most notably in the Baja 500 and 1000, John Clark rode motorcycles and trucks, refusing to appear until Bad Jim (1990), a straight to video film. By 1999, his work with The Clark Gable Foundation had helped revive the house in which his father was born and open it as a museum in Cadiz, Ohio. 380-383 He had two children: Kayley Gable (born 1986) and Clark James Gable (1988–2019). Kayley is an actress, while Clark James was the host of two seasons of the nationally syndicated reality show Cheaters. Clark James died on February 22, 2019, at the age of 30.

Loretta Young, the film's lead actress, became pregnant with Gable's child during filming of The Call of the Wild in early 1935. Judy Lewis' granddaughter was born in Venice, California, on November 6, 1935. The young girl's pregnancy was not revealed in a complicated plan. She appeared to have adopted the baby nine months after it was born. Most in Hollywood (and some in the public) believed Gable was Lewis' father because of their strong resemblance and their birthdate.

Loretta Young said that Lewis was Lewis' biological mother and that Gable was her father by an accident five years after Gable's death. Young died on August 12, 2000, but her autobiography, published posthumously, confirmed that Gable was indeed Lewis' father. Judy Lewis died of cancer at the age of 76 on November 25, 2011. Young's daughter-in-law alleged that Joyce Lewis was conceived by date rape in 1998, even though Young had previously admitted to an affair with Gable and it was a well-known Hollywood mystery; they later claimed that they had been unaware of the fact until both Young and Lewis were dead, but that neither Young and Lewis were dead for many years before the claim was made.

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Life and career

William Clark Gable was born in Cadiz, Ohio, on February 1, 1901, to William Henry "Will" Gable (1870-1948), an oil-well driller, and his wife Adeline (née Hershelman). His father was a Protestant and his mother was a Catholic. After his father, Gable was named William, but Clark was almost always referred to as "the kid" by his father. 1: He was mistakenly listed as male and female in the county register due to the doctor's illegible handwriting; the clerk later changed it to male. He had Belgian and German roots. When he was baptized at a Roman Catholic church in Dennison, Ohio, he was six months old. His mother died when he was ten months old. His father refused to raise him in the Catholic faith, sparking scathing remarks from the Hershelman family. The dispute was settled when his father agreed to spend time with his maternal uncle Charles Hershelman and his wife on their farm in Vernon Township, Pennsylvania. Jennie Dunlap (1874–1920), Gable's father, married Jennie Dunlap (1873–1920).

The tall, shy child who had a booming voice was well-dressed and well-groomed, according to Gable's stepmother. She played the piano and gave him lessons at home. He took up brass instruments shortly after becoming the only boy in the Hopedale Men's town band at age 13. With his father, who insisted that he partake in masculine hobbies such as hunting and hard physical labor, Gable was mechanically inclined and loved to repair cars. Gable also loved literature; he would recite Shakespeare among reputable companies, particularly the sonnets.

In 1917, his father suffered with money and decided to try his hand at farming, and the family moved to Palmyra Township, near Akron, Ohio. His father insisted that he dogged the farm, but Gable went to work in Akron for the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company.

Since seeing the film The Bird of Paradise at age 17, Gable was inspired to become an actor, but he wasn't able to start acting until he turned 21 and received his $300 inheritance from a Hershelman trust. Since his stepmother died in 1920, his father moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma, to return to the oil industry. Before heading to the Pacific Northwest, he worked with his father for a time wildcatting and sludge removing in the oil fields of Oklahoma.

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Grasable visited two-class stock companies, finding jobs with traveling tent shows, lumber mills, and other odd jobs. He moved from Midwest to Portland, Oregon, where he worked as a necktie salesman in the Meier & Frank department store. Earle Larimore, a local stage actor (the nephew of Laura Hope Crews who played Aunt Pittypat with Gable in Gone with the Wind), who encouraged Gable to reprise acting (and encouraged her to reprise acting). Despite that Larimore did not invite him to join his theater group The Red Lantern Players, he did introduce Gable to Franz Dorfler, one of the company's founders, and the two began dating. 18 After the couple's audition for The Astoria Players, Gable's lack of preparation was evident, but the theater company accepted him after cajoling from Larimore. Gable and Dorfler began touring with the company until its bankruptcy, then moved to Portland, Oregon, where Gable and Dorfler learned intense lessons in the evening.

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Josephine Dillon, Gable's acting coach, was a theatre manager in Portland. She paid to have his teeth fixed and his hair styled. She aided him in developing his chronically hungry body and taught him how to exercise and posture. He gradually managed to tone down his naturally high-pitched voice, his speech habits improved, and his facial expressions became more natural and convincing. After a lengthy period of her training, Dillon decided that she was able to pursue a film career.

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In 1924, Gable and Dillon went to Hollywood. Dillon was both his boss and his wife, having lived in Dillon for 17 years. Clark Gable to Clark Gable (1925), The Merry Widow (1925), The Plastic Age (1925), starring Clara Bow and Pola Negri (1924) starring Pola Negri, changed his stage name from W. C. Gable to Clark Gable (1925) and Clark Gable (1924). He appeared in a pair of two-reel comedies called The Pacemakers, as well as in Fox's The Johnstown Flood (1926). In a sequence of shorts, he also appeared as a bit player. However, he was not given any major film roles, so he returned to the stage in What Price Glory? (1925).

Lionel Barrymore scolded Gable for amateurish behavior, but urged him to pursue a stage career, but he became a lifelong friend. 36 During the 1927–28 theater season in Houston, Texas, he appeared with the Laskin Brothers Stock Company; while there, he gained a wealth of knowledge, gained extensive knowledge, and became a local matinee idol. He then migrated to New York City, where Dillon found work on Broadway for him. He got positive feedback in Machinal (1928), with one commentator describing him as "new, vivacious, and brutally masculine."

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While Gable and Dillon separated in March 1929, they began performing on the play Hawk Island in New York, which ran for 24 performances. 56–57 years ago, Gable's divorce became final in April 1930, and a few days later, he married Texas socialite Maria Franklin Prentiss Lucas Langham, nicknamed "Ria." They were married again in 1931, owing to differences in state legal requirements.

In 1930, Gable, the seething and terrified character created in the Los Angeles stage production of The Last Mile, was offered a deal with Pathe Pictures. In their low-budget William Boyd Western, The Painted Desert (1931), his first film for them and first appearance in a sound picture was as the unshaven villain. Since the film's delay in its arrival, the studio had financial difficulties, so Gable left for Warner Bros.

Gable played a scheming chauffeur who knocked Barbara Stanwyck's character unconscious for trying to save two children when he was methodically starving to death. The supporting role was originally planned for James Cagney until the introduction of The Public Enemy, which elevated him to stardom. After testing him for the second male lead in the studio's gangster comedy Little Caesar (1931), Warner Bros. executive Darryl F. Zanuck about Gable said, "his ears are too wide and he looks like an ape." Gable was signed by MGM's Irving Thalberg in 1930 after a failed screen test for Zanuck. 64 He hired Minna Wallis, a cousin of producer Hal Wallis, as his agent, with clients including actresses Claudette Colbert, Myrna Loy, and Norma Shearer.

Gable's arrival in Hollywood came as MGM was hoping to expand its male cast members, and he paid the bill. Wallace Beery took two photographs in 1931. In the first, he had a seventh-billed support role in The Secret Six, but his contribution was much larger than the billing would have indicated, and then he received second billing in a small part almost equal to the film's star Beery in the naval aviation film Hell Divers. Howard Strickling, MGM's publicity manager, began to build Gable's studio image with Screenland magazine, touting his "lumberjack-in-evening-clothes" persona.

MGM paired him with well-known female stars in order to increase his fame. Joan Crawford arranged for him as her co-star in Dance, Fools, Dance (1931). This was his first appearance on film. The pair's energy was uncovered by studio manager Louis B. Mayer, who not only shot them in seven more films but also began reshooting Complete Surrender, replacing John Mack Brown as Crawford's leading man and retitling the film Laughing Sinners (1931). After playing A Free Soul (1931), in which he played a gangster who shoved the character played by Norma Shearer, Gable never played a supporting role again. As a result of his appearance, he attracted a lot of fan mail; the studio took note. Clark Gable's on the screen said, "A actor in the making has been created, one that will outdraw every other actor" in our estimation.

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Susan Lenox (Her Fall and Rise) (1931) with Greta Garbo and Possessed (1931), a film about an illicit affair starring Joan Crawford (who was then married to Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.), a Gable co-starring Susan Lenox (Her Fall and Rise) (1931) with Greta Garbo. Gable and Crawford's real-life romance was later described as "the one that almost burned Hollywood down" by Adela Rogers St. Johns. Louis B. Mayer threatened to end both of their employment, but they fell apart for a while as Gable shifted his attention to Marion Davies, who appeared with her in Polly of the Circus (1932). Gable had been considered for Tarzan the Ape Man's role, but he was denied by Johnny Weissmuller's more imposing physique and a strong swimming prowess. In Strange Interlude (1932), Gable starred as the romantic lead, first teaming with Shearer in the second of three films they would make together for MGM.

In the romantic comedy-drama Red Dust (1932), Gable appeared alongside Jean Harlow in the setting of a rubber plantation in Indochina. On her arrival, Gable played a plantation manager in Harlow's witty prostitute; however, Gable's character began to pursue Mary Astor's prim, classy newlywed. Although some commentators believed Harlow stole the show, many agreed that Gable was a natural screen companion.

With braless Jean Harlow in Red Dust, Gable's "unshaven love-making" made him MGM's most popular romantic leading man. With Gable established as a performer in Night Flight, MGM positioned him in the same vein as Harlow for Myrna Loy, a previously under budget actor on Night Flight, bringing Loy to a costar role in Men in White, a 1933 film that was delayed due to pre-Code deficency restrictions until 1934. With a resulting pregnancy complications, a delicate topic and a new Gable photo, the role of doctor (Gable) and nurse (Loy) implied intimacy.

Gable and Harlow were then joined in Hold Your Man (1933), China Seas (1935), in which the two were billed above co-star Wallace Beery (1936) and Wife vs. Secretary (1936), with Myrna Loy costarring and supported by newcomer James Stewart. Gable and Harlow made six films together in five years, making them a hit on screen and off. Saratoga (1937), their last film together, was a bigger success than their previous collaborations. Harlow's manufacturing process ended. The film was ninety percent complete, and the remaining scenes were shot with long shots or with doubles like Mary Dees; Gable said he felt as if he were "in the arms of a ghost."

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MGM did not have a project planned for Gable that he was involved in in in 1934, and it cost him $2,000 a week to do nothing. Louis B. Mayer, the company's director, lent him to Columbia for $2,500 per week, bringing the total loss to the corporation. Gable was not meant to be the first choice of newspaper reporter Peter Warne in the romantic comedy It Happened One Night (1934) opposite Claudette Colbert portraying a spoiled heiress, but Columbia demanded him and paid handsomely for it. Robert Montgomery was originally tempted to direct but said he declined because the script was bad.

The film's production, which requires Gable and Colbert's characters to travel together from Florida to New York by whatever means possible, began in a dramatic atmosphere; nevertheless, both Gable and director Frank Capra loved making it. With Gable receiving accolades for Best Actor and Colbert for Best Actress, It Happened One Night became the first movie to sweep all five major Academy Awards. "Critics praised the fast-paced farce that would enter a whole new romantic genre: the screwball comedy." The movie opened slowly at the box office, but word of mouth soon became a big success, with men's underwear sales plummeting because Gable didn't wear an undershirt in the film.

Gable's career was revived by his comedic, positive-natured appearance, and to Capra, Gable's character in the film closely resembled his real personae:

It Happened One Night made Gable's fame a lot bigger celebrity than ever. He was on the top of the box office money-makers lists from 1934 to 1942, when World War II interrupted his film career.

Gable's first film role at MGM was to portray a reluctant leader of mutineers Fletcher Christian, an "Englishman in knickers and a three-cornered hat," one of which he had to be talked into by friend and producer Irving Thalberg, and of which Gable said "I stink in it" after filming. Mutiny on the Bounty (1935), a critical and commercial success, received eight Academy Award nominations. There were three Best Actor awards for actors Gable, Charles Laughton, and Franchot Tone, and the film received Best Picture, the second of three films in which Gable played a leading role. The film cost $2 million and grossed $4.5 million, making it one of the top moneymakers of the decade. It was partially shot in Catalina and French Polynesia, using life-size replicas of Bounty and Pandora. Clark Gable is accused of dating Loretta Young while on an overnight train from a studio location to Hollywood in 1935.

Spencer Tracy's career was boosted by his work and permanently cemented them in the public eye as a unit. Tracy appeared in an Oscar-nominated portrayal of a Catholic priest who knocks Gable down in a boxing ring in San Francisco (1936). The film was a box office hit and it's currently the third-highest-grossing film of Gable's career. Test Pilot (1938), with Myrna Loy, who made seven films with Gable, was the Academy Award-nominated box office winner (1938). Jim Lane, the title's test pilot, appears; Tracy is his sidekick mechanic, Gunner Morse.

Tracy will play a larger role in their last film, 1940's Boom Town, with billing immediately below Gable and above Claudette Colbert and Hedy Lamarr. The film, which was a lavish epic about two oil wildcatters who became partners rather than rivals, was a box office hit, grossing $5 million. Tracy was one of the few Hollywood celebrities to attend Lombard's private funeral, alongside Gable and Tracy. There were no more Gable-Tracy partnerships after Boom Town; Tracy's growth resulted in a new deal; and both actors had conflicting stipulations requiring top billing in MGM movie credits and on promotional posters.

Despite his reluctation to perform the role, Gable is best known for his role in the Academy Award-winning best picture Gone with the Wind (1939). Carole Lombard may have been the first to suggest that he play Rhett Butler (and she play Scarlett) after she bought him a copy of the best-seller, which she refused to read.

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Butler's last line in Gone with the Wind: "I admit, my dear, I don't give a damn," is one of the most famous lines in film history. With both public and producer David O. Selznick, Gable was a close second favorite for the role of Rhett. Selznick had no male actors under long-term employment, so he had to place an actor in another studio in order to borrow an actor. Selznick's first pick, Gary Cooper, was Selznick's first choice. "Gone With the Wind is going to be the biggest flop in Hollywood history" when Cooper turned down Butler's role. Clark Gable will go to the hospital on his nose, not me," says the narrator. Selznick was determined to fire Gable and set about finding a way to borrow him from MGM by then. Gable was afraid of losing an audience that had ruled that no one else would play the part. "I think I know now how a fly will respond after being trapped in a spider's web," he later admitted.

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On both accounts, Gable bonded well with co-stars and was a good friend with actress Hattie McDaniel; even suggesting a real alcoholic drink during the scene when they were commemorating Scarlett and Rhett's daughter's birth. According to Lennie Bluett, a film actor, Gable almost walked off the set after finding that the studio grounds were separated and signage with the words "White" and "Colored" were posted. Victor Fleming, a filmmaker on film, told him, "If you don't get those signs down, you won't get your Rhett Butler." The signs were then taken down. Since African American McDaniel and Butterfly McQueen were not allowed to attend, Gable attempted to protest the Gone with the Wind premiere in segregated Atlanta. According to reports, he was only gone after McDaniel begged for him to leave. They appeared in many more films, remained life-long friends, and they attended her Hollywood premieres.

Since Rhett inadvertently caused Scarlett to miscarry their second child, Gable did not want to shed tears for the scene. Olivia de Havilland made him scream and then said, "Oh, he would not do it."

He would not!

Victor (Fleming) tried everything with him. He threatened him on a professional basis. We had done it without him weeping many times, but then we had one last attempt. "You can do it, I know you can do it, and it will be amazing," I said. Right before the cameras started, you could see the tears well and he did an excellent job on the scene. "He poured his entire heart into it." The role was one of Gable's most varied performances, partly based on the director and friend Fleming's personality.

Years later, Gable said that when his career came to an end, a re-release of Gone with the Wind would quickly revive his fame, and he continued to be a top-selling actor for the remainder of his life. "Clark Gable never tires of being held Vivien Leigh," one recalled.

Gable's marriage and birth in 1939 to his third wife, actress Carole Lombard (1908-1942), was one of his finest personal lives. 189–201 They met while filming 1932's No Man of Her Own, when Lombard was still married to actor William Powell. Since being reacquainted at a party, a Gable and Lombard romance didn't take off until 1936. They were soon inseparable, with fan magazines and tabloids quoting them as a formal couple.

Once stating, gable flourished being around Lombard's youthful, charming, and frank persona.

Gable was still married, suffering a costly divorce from his second wife, Ria Langham, until his income from Gone with the Wind enabled him to reach a divorce agreement with her on March 7, 1939. In Kingman, Arizona, 200-201 and honeymooned in room 1201 of the Arizona Biltmore Hotel during a production break on Gone with the Wind, Gable, and Lombard. They purchased a ranch that had previously owned by director Raoul Walsh in Encino, California, for $50,000, making it their home. The couple, who affectionately referred to each other as "Ma and Pa," owned a farm, raised chickens, and horses.

Several Hollywood celebrities got involved in the 9/11 bombing of Pearl Harbor, including James Stewart, who volunteered for active service. Carole Lombard sent President Roosevelt a letter expressing her passion in doing so, but F.D.R. The 41-year-old actor's convictions, as Lombard's relentlessly began, could be most effective in films and bond drives.

Lombard, a passenger on Transcontinental and Western Air Flight 3 with her mother and press agent Otto Winkler, was a passenger on January 16, 1942. When the flight's DC-3 airliner crashed into Potosi Mountain near Las Vegas, Nevada, killing all 22 passengers aboard, including 15 servicemen en route to training in California, she had just finished her 57th film, To Be or Not to Be. able rushed to the crash site to retrieve his wife, mother-in-law, and Winkler, who had been named the best man at Gable and Lombard's wedding. Lombard was proclaimed to be the first war-related female casualty of World War II, and President Roosevelt sent her a personal note of condolence. The pilot error was discovered during the crash by the Civil Aeronautics Board, which was ruled out.

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She had been to her Encino ranch and fulfilled her funeral aspirations had been fulfilled in her will. In Lana Turner's second film together, Somewhere I'll Find You, he returned to the studio to work with Lana Turner. After losing 20 pounds after the shooting, Gable was clearly distraught emotionally and physically, but Turner said that Gable remained a "consummate professional" for the duration of filming. He appeared in 27 more films and remarried twice more. According to Esther Williams, "but he was never the same." "He had been devastated by Carole's death."

Gable appeared in the World War II romantic intrigue film, Idiot's Delight (1939), between his marriage to Lombard and his death. He plays a nightclub singer who doesn't recognize his former lover (Shearer), though Nazis are beginning to restrict guests at a hotel on the brink of war. "Puttin' on the Ritz" and an alternative ending make the film a hit on Gable's song and dance routine, as well as an alternate ending.

Gable appeared in Strange Cargo (1940), a romantic drama starring Joan Crawford and Ian Hunter, costarring Peter Lorre and Ian Hunter. In an escape from the penal colony, Gable and French Devil's Islands prisoners are released in a film about them. In an escape from the penal colony, they met a local entertainer (Crawford) who Gable had encountered earlier in the film. Gable and Crawford "again demonstrated their on-screen magic" in their eighth and final film together, and the film was one of the top ten grossing films of the year.

Gable's first film with Lana Turner, a 20-year-old Lana Turner, was a debutant who MGM considered a replacement for both Crawford and the now-deceased Jean Harlow. Honky Tonk (1941) is a western in which Gable's con-man/gambler romances Turner, a prim, young judge's daughter. In the required romantic scenes, Gable was reluctant to perform opposite the younger Turner. They did a good job in this and three subsequent films, with Honky Tonk finishing third at the box office that year.

Since the couple had been in a lot of buzz with the media, Gable and Turner were paired in Somewhere I'll Find You (1941) as war correspondents who travel to the Pacific theater and become trapped in a Japanese war. The film was another hit, despite being No. 1. For 1942, there were 8 people at the box office. After Gone With the Wind "hardly befitted a national celebrity" and began a career decline for Gable, film historian David Thomson outlined the quality of his films.

Following Lombard's death and completion of the film Somewhere I'll Find You, Gable joined the United States Army under the Army Air Forces on August 12, 1942. Lombard had suggested that Gable enlist as part of the war effort, but MGM was reluctant to let him go. Following basic education, the Commanding General of the United States Army Air Forces, Henry H. "Hap" Arnold gave Gable a "unique assignment" with the First Motion Picture Unit.

Gable underwent a physical examination at Bolling Field on June 19, before arriving at the service, according to the Washington Evening Star.

Upon enlisting in a bomber training program, Gable had expressed an earlier interest in officer candidate school with the intention of becoming an aerial shooter. MGM arranged for his studio friend, cinematographer Andrew McIntyre, to enlist with him and accompany him through training.

He and McIntyre were sent to Miami Beach, Florida, where they entered USAAF Class 42-E on August 17, 1942, just after his enlistment. Both started training on October 28, 1942, and were sent as second lieutenants. Gable's class of about 2,600 students (of which he ranked at 700th) selected him as its graduation speaker. cadets were given their commissions by GM, according to General Arnold. Arnold also told Gable of his special assignment: to make a recruiting film in combat with the Eighth Air Force in order to recruit aerial gunners. On arrival, Gable and McIntyre were taken to Flexible Gunnery School in Tyndall Field, Florida, and then moved to first lieutenants upon completion.

Gable sent the 351st Bomb Group and accompanying it to England as head of a six-man motion picture unit on January 27, 1943. He recruited screenwriter John Lee Mahin, camera operators Sgts, and McIntyre. Mario Toti and Robert Boles, as well as Lt. Howard Voss, are needed to complete his crew. While he was with the 351st Bomb Group at Pueblo Army Air Base, Colorado, he was promoted to captain, a rank commensurate with his service as a unit commander. (Prior to this, he and McIntyre were the first lieutenants in the military.)

With the 351st Bomb Group, Gable spent the majority of 1943 in England. Gable completed five combat missions, one in Germany to Germany as an observer-gunner in B-17 Flying Fortresses between May 4 and September 23, 1943, receiving the Air Medal and the Distinguished Flying Cross for his efforts. During one of the missions, Gable's aircraft was destroyed by flak and attackers, who knocked out one of the engines and shot up the stabilizer. One crewman was killed and two others were injured, and another was injured, and flak went through Gable's boot and barely avoided his head. As MGM learnt of the story, studio executives began to press the Army Air Forces to reassign its most valuable screen actor to noncombat service. In November 1943, Gable returned to the United States to edit his film on an old Warner's lot donated to the war effort, as the 18th AAF Base Unit (Motion Picture Unit) at Culver City, California, where other actors had no film equipment available.

In June 1944, Gable was promoted to major. Although he was looking for another war service, Captain (later US president) Ronald Reagan signed his discharge papers on June 12, 1944, when he was stationed on inactive service. The film Combat America, a gable finished editing of the film in September 1944, giving the narration his own and making use of numerous interviews with enlisted gunners as the film's focus. He resigned his commission on September 26, 1947, a week after the Air Force's national service branch became a separate service branch, because his moving picture manufacturing schedule made it impossible for him to do reserve officer duties.

Adolf Hitler favored Gable over all other actors. During World War II, Hitler gave a large reward to anyone who could capture and bring Gable safely to him.

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For his service, Gable was given the Distinguished Flying Cross, Air Medal, American Campaign Medal, European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal, and the World War II Victory Award. He had earned his wings after finishing a flexible gunnery academy at Tyndall field.

In the film Command Decision (1948), he played a World War II brigadier general who supervised bombing raids over Germany, making good use of his wartime experiences. "His is a convincing performance," Variety said, interpreting the brigadier-general's characterization of the man's death with an attitude that expresses his sympathy with the soldier."

Gable returned to his ranch and rested immediately after being released from service. He revived a pre-war friendship with Virginia Grey, a co-star from Test Pilot and Idiot's Delight, who appeared in Terror and Idiot's Delight, who appeared in newspaper reports as the next Mrs. Gable. Adventure (1945), with Greer Garson, was Gable's first film after World War II, by then the leading female actress at MGM. The film was a commercial success, but a critical loss, given the popular teaser tagline "Gable's back and Garson's got him."

Gable was praised for his appearance in The Hucksters (1947), a post-war Madison Avenue satire of misdeed and immorality, starring Deborah Kerr and Ava Gardner. The film was well-received at the box office, landing 11th in the category, but Variety and The New York Times described it as a sanitized version of the story, with script problems, but the protagonists were unable to perform in the role.

With Homecoming (1948), where he played a married doctor enlisted in World War II and Lana Turner's army surgical nurse role, a romance was resurfacing in flashbacks. Walter Pidgeon, Van Johnson, Brian Donlevy, and John Hodiak appeared in Command Decision (1948), a war film. It was a hit with audiences, but MGM lost money due to the all-star cast's high cost.

Following this, Paulette Goddard's public and brief affair came to an end. Gable married Sylvia Ashley, a British model and actress who had previously married Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., in 1949. They divorced in 1952, and the marriage was very unhappy; they were divorced in 1952.

Any Number Can Play (1950) with Alexis Smith, Key to the City (1950) with Barbara Stanwyck, and To Please a Lady (1950) with Barbara Stanwyck (1950). They were reasonably popular, but with two Westerns, he had more success: Across the Wide Missouri (1951) and Lone Star (1952).

He made Never Let Me Go (1953), opposite Gene Tierney, who later appeared in Never Let Me Go (1953). Tierney was one of Gable's favorites, but she was extremely distraught when she was forced to be substituted in Mogambo by Grace Kelly.

Mogambo (1953), directed by John Ford, was a somewhat sanitized and more action-oriented recreation of Gable's hit pre-Code film Red Dust starring Jean Harlow and Mary Astor. Ava Gardner, in her third and final pairing with Gable, was well-received in Harlow's leading lady role, as well as Kelly in Astor's role, with both actors and actresses nominated for Leading Actress and Supporting Actress, respectively. When on location in Africa, reports of an affair between Gable and Kelly emerged (the result of private dinners the actors were having), but Kelly later reflected on the fact that the marriage was not intimate, "perhaps because of the age difference." As the film came to a close, only helped with ticket sales. There are 7 people at the box office this year, his most popular hit since returning to MGM after the war.

Despite the positive critical and public reaction to Mogambo, Gable became more dissatisfied with what he perceived as inferior MGM's work, although the studio thought his compensation was excessive. Louis B. Mayer, the studio's owner, was fired in 1951 amid lower sales and increased Hollywood production costs, owing in large part to television's increasing success. Former studio director Dore Schary, the studio's former engineer, had trouble retaining revenue for the studio. Many long-serving MGM stars, such as Greer Garson and Judy Garland, were either shot or their deals were not renewed.

Gable refused to renew his deal. Betrayed (1954), an espionage wartime drama starring Turner and Victor Mature, was MGM's last film at the MGM. "Gable and Turner just don't click the way they should here," critic Paul Mavis said. "poor plots and lines have never stopped these two pros from making good appearances in other films." In March 1954, Gable left MGM.

His next two films were produced for 20th Century Fox: Soldier of Fortune, an adventure tale in Hong Kong with Susan Hayward, and The Tall Men (1955), a Western starring Jane Russell and Robert Ryan. Both were profitable, but only modest successes, with Gable receiving his first profit sharing royalties. In 1955, Gable would rank 10th at the box office, the first time he had been in the top ten.

Kay Spreckels, Gable's fifth wife, married in the same year (née Kathleen Williams). She had previously been married three times: first to Charles Capps (1937–39), then to Argentinian cattle tycoon Martn de Alzaga (1942–43), and finally to sugar-refining heir Adolph B. Spreckels, Jr. (1945–52). Bunker Spreckels, a former teenager who went on to live a notorious celebrity lifestyle in the late 1960s and early 1970s surfing scene, died young in 1977.

Gable's grandfather, Robert Waterfield, and her partner Jane Russell, created Russ-Field-Gabco in 1955, a film Gable thought would also feature Russell in The Tall Men's moderate success. Jo Van Fleet took over Jo Van Fleet's place. It was Gable's first time as a producer. He found producing and acting to be too much work, and Raoul Walsh's western was the only one made.

Despite Gable's role in Universal-International's Away All Boats, his next project was the Warner Bros. production Band of Angels (1957), co-starring Yvonne De Carlo and starring relative Sidney Poitier; it was not well received; despite Gable's similarity to Rhett Butler. "Here is a film so bad that it must be seen to be disbelieved," Newsweek said.

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In the following months, he partnered Doris Day in Teacher's Pet (1958), shooting in black and white at Paraphrasedoutput. He starred in Run Silent, Run Deep (also 1958), co-star and producer Burt Lancaster, which was his first on-screen death since 1937 and received raves. Gable began receiving television offers but refused them outright. "Now it's time I acted my age," Gable said at 57. 361 His contracts were built with a provision that ended his filming and working days at 5 p.m.

Paramount's next two films, But Not for Me (1959) with Carroll Baker, and It Came in Naples (1960) with Sophia Loren, were light comedies. Melville Shavelson wrote and directed Naples, and it mainly displayed the splendor of Loren and the Italian island Capri. It was a box-office hit and was nominated for an Academy Award for art direction and two Golden Globes, one for photography and another for actress in a leading role. It was mostly shot on location in Italy and Gable's last film to be released in color. Although Gable's weight had risen to 230 pounds, something he attributed to pasta, he embarked on a crash diet to reach a 195-pound target weight, along with temporarily stopping drinking and smoking, was not required for his next film.

Gable was honored on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his work in motion pictures on February 8, 1960, located at 1608 Vine Street.

The Misfits (1961), Arthur Miller's script and directed by John Huston, Gable's last film. Marilyn Monroe (in her last completed film) Montgomery Clift, Eli Wallach, and Thelma Ritter appeared alongside Gable. Many commentators regard Gable's appearance as his best, and Gable after seeing the rough cuts, but not receive any Oscar nominations. In Reno, Nevada, Miller wrote the screenplay for his wife Monroe; it was about two old cowboys and a pilot who go mustanging, and the blondes were all searching for a blonde. It was a little disconnected film with its antihero western themes in 1961, but it has since been a classic.

In what is described as a typical "on-the-set" scene during the film's turbulent production, portraitist Al Hirschfeld drew a sketch and then a lithograph depicting the film's actors Clift, Monroe, and Gable with screenwriter Miller. "You have to pass a physical to film that," Gable recalled in a 2002 documentary "He was a professional going home at 5 p.m. to a pregnant woman." "Mr. Gable's appearance as a leathery old cowboy with a realistic slant on most basic subjects" was "important," according to the New York Times, with his death before the film's release.

Though Gable was a centrist Republican, he never explicitly talked about politics. Carole Lombard, his third wife, was an activist liberal Democrat, and she persuaded him to support Democratic president Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal. He was a founding member of the conservative Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, an anti-communist group, alongside Ronald Reagan, John Wayne, Gary Cooper, and other conservative actors and film-makers in 1944. He attended a televised rally in New York in February 1952, where he urged General Dwight D. Eisenhower to run for president, while both sides of the opposition continued to search Eisenhower. Despite being sick of a severe coronary disease, Gable voted by mail for Richard Nixon in the 1960 presidential election.

On November 6, 1960, Gable was admitted to Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center in Los Angeles, where doctors discovered he had suffered a heart attack. His condition was described as stable in newspaper reports the following day. He seemed to be improving by the morning of November 16, but the evening he died of a second heart attack caused by an infection. Gable's heart was not affected by the obstructive response, and a defibrillator was not available.

Gable is laid to rest in the Great Mausoleum, Memorial Terrace in Glendale, next to Carole Lombard and her mother. Spencer Tracy and James Stewart, an honor guard and pallbearers, were among the guests on hand. Kay Gable died two years ago and was interred there as well.

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