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Post by *~Mrs. Cooper ~* on Oct 7, 2006 17:58:50 GMT -5
Birth name
Frank James Cooper
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nickname
Coop
Cowboy Cooper
The Montana Mule
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Height
6' 3" (1.91 m)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mini biography
Born to Alice and Charles Cooper (not in film business). Gary attended school at Dunstable school England, Helena Montana and Iowa College, Grinnell, Iowa. His first stage experience was during high school and college. Afterwards, he worked as an extra for one year before getting a part in a two reeler by Hans Tissler (an independent producer). Eileen Sedgwick was his first leading lady. He then appeared in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) for United Artists before moving to Paramount. While there he appeared in a small part in Wings (1927), It (1927), and other films.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mini biography
"Dad was a true Westerner, and I take after him", Gary Cooper told people who wanted to know more about his life before Hollywood. Dad was Charles Henry Cooper, who left his native England at 19, became a lawyer and later a Montana State Supreme Court justice. In 1906, when Gary was 5, his dad bought the Seven-Bar-Nine, a 600-acre ranch that had originally been a land grant to the builders of the railroad through that part of Montana. In 1910, Gary's mother, who had been ill, was advised to take a long sea voyage by her doctor. She went to England and stayed there until the United States entered World War I. Gary and his older brother Arthur stayed with their mother and went to school in England for seven years. Too young to go to war, Gary spent the war years working on his father's ranch. "Getting up at 5 o'clock in the morning in the dead of winter to feed 450 head of cattle and shoveling manure at 40 below ain't romantic", said the man who would take the Western to the top of its genre in High Noon (1952). So well liked was Cooper that he aroused little envy when, in 1939, the U.S. Treasury Department said that he was the nation's top wage earner. That year he earned $482,819. This tall, silent hero was the American ideal for many people of his generation. Ernest Hemingway who lived his novels before he wrote them, was happy to have Gary Cooper play his protagonists in A Farewell to Arms (1932) and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943).
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Spouse
Sandra Shaw (15 December 1933 - 13 May 1961) (his death) 1 child
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Trivia
Hobbies: Fishing, hunting, riding, swimming, and taxidermy.
In the early 1930s, his doctor told him he had been working too hard. Cooper went to Europe and stayed a lot longer than planned. When he returned, he was told there was now a "new" Gary Cooper - an unknown actor needed a better name for films, so the studio had reversed Gary Cooper's initials and created a name that sounded similar - Cary Grant.
Along with actress Mylène Demongeot, Cooper set in motion the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris on June 7 1957.
Interred at Sacred Heart Cemetery, Southampton, Long Island, New York, USA.
Worked as a Yellowstone Park guide for several seasons before becoming an actor.
Father-in-law of pianist and composer Byron Janis.
Inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 1966.
Pictured on one of four 25¢ US commemorative postage stamps issued 23 March 1990 honoring classic films released in 1939. The stamp featured Cooper as the title character of Beau Geste (1939). The other films honored were Stagecoach (1939), The Wizard of Oz (1939), and Gone with the Wind (1939).
Upon seeing him, a professor in the theater department at Grinnell College recorded "shows no promise."
Father of Maria Cooper.
Despite his wholesome screen image, he was an infamous (and privately boastful) lady-killer in reality, allegedly having had affairs with numerous and sometimes very famous leading ladies throughout his career. This was in spite of the fact that he had a faithful wife, Sandra, and that many of his lovers were also married.
His Oscar-winning roles as Will Kane from High Noon (1952) and Sgt. Alvin York from Sergeant York (1941) were ranked #5 and #35 in the American Film Institute's Heroes list in their 100 years of The Greatest Screen Heroes and Villains.
He was voted the 18th Greatest Movie Star of all time by Entertainment Weekly.
Is mentioned in the Irving Berlin song "Puttin' On The Ritz" (performe by Taco) and in the song "La derrière séance" by Eddy Mitchell.
He was voted the 42nd Greatest Movie Star of all time by Premiere Magazine.
He was fond of dogs, at various times he owned boxers, Dobermans and Great Danes. He and his wife also raised Sealyhams.
He liked sports and kept in shape with hiking and riding, tennis and golf, archery and skiing, trout fishing and spear fishing, swimming and scuba diving and driving fast cars. He liked boxing.
His first Hollywood love was Clara Bow. Shortly after they separated he dated and lived with Lupe Velez.
Appeared in 107 movies, 82 of which he starred in. Only 16 of those were filmed in color. And he starred in 14 silent movies.
Has starred in a total number of 20 westerns, 3 of those were silent.
His mother's favorite movie of his is The Pride of the Yankees (1942).
His appetite was prodigious, but no matter how much he ate, he always remained thin. During his early years in Hollywood, working odd jobs and living with his parents, he said, he said with some comic exaggeration, that his "starvation diet at the time ran to no less than a dozen eggs a day, a couple of loaves of bread, a platter of bacon, and just enough pork chops between meals to keep me going until I got home for supper." His specialty on hunting trips was gargantuan: wild duck covered with bacon strips, enhanced by four eggs and steak. He could eat a cherry pie and drink a quart of milk for lunch.
He blew the harmonica and strummed the guitar; played backgammon and bridge; grew corn and avocados on the Encino ranch he bought in the early 1930s and loved to work with his tractor in the garden.
Named the #11 Greatest Actor on The 50 Greatest Screen Legends list by the American Film Institute
He starred in two movies that were based on novels by Ernest Hemingway: A Farewell to Arms (1932) and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943).
His income from his movies was: 1932 - $85,000, 1933 - $133,000, 1934 - $258,000, 1935 - $328,000, 1937 - $370,000
From 1938 to 1942 he earned $150,000 per picture.
He signed a six year contract with Samuel Goldwyn, to make six pictures at $150,000 per picture. At the time Paramount had legal rights to Cooper and threatened to sue. The two companies came to an understanding that Paramount would loan Cooper to Goldywn to make one picture a year from 1938-1942.
Appeared on the cover of Life magazine November 24, 1941.
Has played six real life characters on screen. Wild Bill Hickok, Marco Polo, Sgt. Alvin C. York, Lou Gehrig, Dr. Commander Corydon M. Wassell and Gen. Billy Mitchell.
In 1944 he formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Samuel Goldwyn. His partners were Leo Spitz, William Goetz and Nunnally Johnson. They only produced two movies, Casanova Brown (1944) and Along Came Jones (1945). Then in 1946 they sold International Pictures to Universal Pictures, which changed its name to Universal-International.
He was a conservative Republican. He voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, and for Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932. He actively campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940, strongly believing that Franklin Delano Roosevelt should serve no more than two terms of office, and endorsed Thomas E. Dewey in 1944.
By June 1955 he had made 80 films from which the studio's earned $250 million and he only earned $6 million in salary and percentages.
By 1942 he left Goldwyn and Paramount, then formed his own production company, then on October 22, 1947 he signed with Warner Brothers to make $295,000 per picture.
His father Charles Cooper died of pneumonia on September 18th 1946, three months after Gary completed Cloak and Dagger (1946) and 3 days after his father's 81st birthday.
Starred in two movies with Teresa Wright, The Pride of the Yankees (1942) and Casanova Brown (1944).
Sam Wood directed him in four movies, The Pride of the Yankees (1942), For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943), Casanova Brown (1944) and Saratoga Trunk (1945).
Cecil B. DeMille directed him in The Plainsman (1936), North West Mounted Police (1940), The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944) and Unconquered (1947).
Frank Capra directed him in two movies, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) and Meet John Doe (1941).
Appeared in four movies with Fay Wray, The First Kiss (1928), The Legion of the Condemned (1928), The Texan (1930), One Sunday Afternoon (1933).
Appeared in two movies with Marlene Dietrich, Morocco (1930) and Desire (1936).
Howard Hawks directed him in three movies, Today We Live (1933), Ball of Fire (1941) and Sergeant York (1941).
Appeared in three movies with Barbara Stanwyck, Ball of Fire (1941), Meet John Doe (1941) and Blowing Wild (1953).
Appeared in eight movies with Walter Brennan. These were Watch Your Wife (1926), The Wedding Night (1935), The Cowboy and the Lady (1938), The Westerner (1940), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942) and Task Force (1949).
In 1951, after 25 years in show business, his professional reputation declined, and he was dropped from the Motion Picture Herald's list of the top 10 Box Office performers. In the following year he made a big comeback at the age of fifty-one with High Noon (1952).
Took an acting class from Michael Chekhov
He turned down both Stagecoach (1939) and Gone with the Wind (1939).
He wasn't present to receive his Academy Award in February 1953, for his portrayal of Marshal Will Kane in High Noon (1952). He asked John Wayne to accept it on his behalf.
He left America and Hollywood and didn't return for 18 months. During that time he was in Hawaii, Mexico and France and shot four films: Return to Paradise (1953), Blowing Wild (1953), Garden of Evil (1954) and Vera Cruz (1954).
He formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, in 1958. In 1959 the company made three of his more unusual films: The Hanging Tree (1959), They Came to Cordura (1959) and The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959).
Was romantically linked with Marlene Dietrich
Was very good friends with Ernest Hemingway for twenty years. Hemingway shot himself a month after Cooper's death.
He declined roles in The Big Trail (1930), Stagecoach (1939) and Red River (1948). All of these were subsequently played by John Wayne, whom he met and befriended on the set of Operation Pacific (1951) while Cooper was visiting his mistress, Patricia Neal.
Both of his parents were immigrants to America from England.
On 16 April 1958 he entered the Manhattan Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital for a full face-lift and other cosmetic surgery by Dr John Converse, one of the leading plastic surgeons in America. Newspaper articles commenting on the effects of the operation said his face now looked quite different and the procedure had not been successful.
His shot from High Noon (1952) was used as a Solidarity candidates trademark of the first independent elections in Poland in June 1989 ("There's a new sheriff in town")
In the spring of 1960 he had two operations, one for prostate cancer and then after that a part of his colon removed which was cancerous also. The doctors were sure that they had gotten all of it. His body strengthened and he made the movie The Naked Edge (1961) in England, but while he was making this film he had a lot of pain in his neck and shoulders. When he returned home from England he went back to the doctor and it was then that he had to be told the cancer had metastasized to his lungs and bones. As he did in The Pride of the Yankees (1942) he took it in his stride and said, "If it is God's will, that's all right too." He opted not to take very much treatment.
His reputation as an unthinking conservative seems largely undeserved. Though he appeared as a "friendly witness" before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in 1947, he carefully avoided naming any people he suspected of having Communist sympathies within the Hollywood community. He later starred in High Noon (1952), a western that was an allegory for blacklisting in Hollywood, and strongly defended blacklisted screenwriter Carl Foreman from attacks by the right-wing Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals. Foreman later credited Cooper as the only major star in Hollywood who tried to help him. His mistress Patricia Neal, who did consider herself a liberal, said Gary was "conservative" but "you couldn't call him right-wing". Cooper showed a sense of humor by asking John Wayne to collect his Oscar for him in 1953, after Wayne had criticized High Noon (1952) as "anti-American".
After James Stewart revealed to the world that Cooper was dying of cancer, messages poured in from such friends and well-wishers as Pope John XXIII, former Vice President Richard Nixon, Henry Fonda, Pablo Picasso, Queen Elizabeth II of England, Princess Grace (_Grace Kelly (I)' ) of Monaco, John Wayne, Ernest Hemingway, former President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Bob Hope, Henry Hathaway, Audrey Hepburn, Mel Ferrer, William Goetz, Mary Livingstone(Mrs. Jack Benny) and Jack Benny, Gloria Stewart (Mrs. James Stewart) and James Stewart, Charles Feldman and Constance and Jerry Wald. The newly inaugurated President John F. Kennedy called from Washington and couldn't get through on the busy Cooper phone, but kept calling. He got through on the second day to talk to Gary for seven minutes.
The pallbearers at the funeral were Cooper's close friends - James Stewart, Henry Hathaway, Jack Benny, William Goetz, Jerry Wald, and Charles Feldman. Rocky and Maria walked behind the casket, alongside Cooper's 87-year-old mother Alice and his brother Arthur, as it was borne through the church to the hearse out on Santa Monica Boulevard. Among the top names of Hollywood attending the services were Norma Shearer, Dean Martin, Walter Pidgeon, Buddy Rogers, Marlene Dietrich, Randolph Scott, Joel McCrea, Frank Sinatra, Burt Lancaster, Jimmy Durante, Martha Hyer, John Wayne, Rosalind Russell, Robert Stack, Maureen O'Sullivan, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Fred Astaire, Bob Hope, Dinah Shore, and Karl Malden. Not one fan broke the lines to ask for an autograph.
Along with Sidney Poitier, is the most represented actor on the American Film Institute's 100 Most Inspiring Movies of All Time, with five of his films on the list. They are: Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) at #83, Sergeant York (1941) at #57, Meet John Doe (1941) at #49, High Noon (1952)_ at #27, and The Pride of the Yankees (1942) at #22.
At the time of his terminal cancer being diagnosed towards the end of 1960, Cooper had signed to star in The Sundowners (1960) and Ride the High Country (1962).
Frank James Cooper
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nickname
Coop
Cowboy Cooper
The Montana Mule
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Height
6' 3" (1.91 m)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mini biography
Born to Alice and Charles Cooper (not in film business). Gary attended school at Dunstable school England, Helena Montana and Iowa College, Grinnell, Iowa. His first stage experience was during high school and college. Afterwards, he worked as an extra for one year before getting a part in a two reeler by Hans Tissler (an independent producer). Eileen Sedgwick was his first leading lady. He then appeared in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) for United Artists before moving to Paramount. While there he appeared in a small part in Wings (1927), It (1927), and other films.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mini biography
"Dad was a true Westerner, and I take after him", Gary Cooper told people who wanted to know more about his life before Hollywood. Dad was Charles Henry Cooper, who left his native England at 19, became a lawyer and later a Montana State Supreme Court justice. In 1906, when Gary was 5, his dad bought the Seven-Bar-Nine, a 600-acre ranch that had originally been a land grant to the builders of the railroad through that part of Montana. In 1910, Gary's mother, who had been ill, was advised to take a long sea voyage by her doctor. She went to England and stayed there until the United States entered World War I. Gary and his older brother Arthur stayed with their mother and went to school in England for seven years. Too young to go to war, Gary spent the war years working on his father's ranch. "Getting up at 5 o'clock in the morning in the dead of winter to feed 450 head of cattle and shoveling manure at 40 below ain't romantic", said the man who would take the Western to the top of its genre in High Noon (1952). So well liked was Cooper that he aroused little envy when, in 1939, the U.S. Treasury Department said that he was the nation's top wage earner. That year he earned $482,819. This tall, silent hero was the American ideal for many people of his generation. Ernest Hemingway who lived his novels before he wrote them, was happy to have Gary Cooper play his protagonists in A Farewell to Arms (1932) and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943).
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Spouse
Sandra Shaw (15 December 1933 - 13 May 1961) (his death) 1 child
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Trivia
Hobbies: Fishing, hunting, riding, swimming, and taxidermy.
In the early 1930s, his doctor told him he had been working too hard. Cooper went to Europe and stayed a lot longer than planned. When he returned, he was told there was now a "new" Gary Cooper - an unknown actor needed a better name for films, so the studio had reversed Gary Cooper's initials and created a name that sounded similar - Cary Grant.
Along with actress Mylène Demongeot, Cooper set in motion the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris on June 7 1957.
Interred at Sacred Heart Cemetery, Southampton, Long Island, New York, USA.
Worked as a Yellowstone Park guide for several seasons before becoming an actor.
Father-in-law of pianist and composer Byron Janis.
Inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 1966.
Pictured on one of four 25¢ US commemorative postage stamps issued 23 March 1990 honoring classic films released in 1939. The stamp featured Cooper as the title character of Beau Geste (1939). The other films honored were Stagecoach (1939), The Wizard of Oz (1939), and Gone with the Wind (1939).
Upon seeing him, a professor in the theater department at Grinnell College recorded "shows no promise."
Father of Maria Cooper.
Despite his wholesome screen image, he was an infamous (and privately boastful) lady-killer in reality, allegedly having had affairs with numerous and sometimes very famous leading ladies throughout his career. This was in spite of the fact that he had a faithful wife, Sandra, and that many of his lovers were also married.
His Oscar-winning roles as Will Kane from High Noon (1952) and Sgt. Alvin York from Sergeant York (1941) were ranked #5 and #35 in the American Film Institute's Heroes list in their 100 years of The Greatest Screen Heroes and Villains.
He was voted the 18th Greatest Movie Star of all time by Entertainment Weekly.
Is mentioned in the Irving Berlin song "Puttin' On The Ritz" (performe by Taco) and in the song "La derrière séance" by Eddy Mitchell.
He was voted the 42nd Greatest Movie Star of all time by Premiere Magazine.
He was fond of dogs, at various times he owned boxers, Dobermans and Great Danes. He and his wife also raised Sealyhams.
He liked sports and kept in shape with hiking and riding, tennis and golf, archery and skiing, trout fishing and spear fishing, swimming and scuba diving and driving fast cars. He liked boxing.
His first Hollywood love was Clara Bow. Shortly after they separated he dated and lived with Lupe Velez.
Appeared in 107 movies, 82 of which he starred in. Only 16 of those were filmed in color. And he starred in 14 silent movies.
Has starred in a total number of 20 westerns, 3 of those were silent.
His mother's favorite movie of his is The Pride of the Yankees (1942).
His appetite was prodigious, but no matter how much he ate, he always remained thin. During his early years in Hollywood, working odd jobs and living with his parents, he said, he said with some comic exaggeration, that his "starvation diet at the time ran to no less than a dozen eggs a day, a couple of loaves of bread, a platter of bacon, and just enough pork chops between meals to keep me going until I got home for supper." His specialty on hunting trips was gargantuan: wild duck covered with bacon strips, enhanced by four eggs and steak. He could eat a cherry pie and drink a quart of milk for lunch.
He blew the harmonica and strummed the guitar; played backgammon and bridge; grew corn and avocados on the Encino ranch he bought in the early 1930s and loved to work with his tractor in the garden.
Named the #11 Greatest Actor on The 50 Greatest Screen Legends list by the American Film Institute
He starred in two movies that were based on novels by Ernest Hemingway: A Farewell to Arms (1932) and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943).
His income from his movies was: 1932 - $85,000, 1933 - $133,000, 1934 - $258,000, 1935 - $328,000, 1937 - $370,000
From 1938 to 1942 he earned $150,000 per picture.
He signed a six year contract with Samuel Goldwyn, to make six pictures at $150,000 per picture. At the time Paramount had legal rights to Cooper and threatened to sue. The two companies came to an understanding that Paramount would loan Cooper to Goldywn to make one picture a year from 1938-1942.
Appeared on the cover of Life magazine November 24, 1941.
Has played six real life characters on screen. Wild Bill Hickok, Marco Polo, Sgt. Alvin C. York, Lou Gehrig, Dr. Commander Corydon M. Wassell and Gen. Billy Mitchell.
In 1944 he formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Samuel Goldwyn. His partners were Leo Spitz, William Goetz and Nunnally Johnson. They only produced two movies, Casanova Brown (1944) and Along Came Jones (1945). Then in 1946 they sold International Pictures to Universal Pictures, which changed its name to Universal-International.
He was a conservative Republican. He voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, and for Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932. He actively campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940, strongly believing that Franklin Delano Roosevelt should serve no more than two terms of office, and endorsed Thomas E. Dewey in 1944.
By June 1955 he had made 80 films from which the studio's earned $250 million and he only earned $6 million in salary and percentages.
By 1942 he left Goldwyn and Paramount, then formed his own production company, then on October 22, 1947 he signed with Warner Brothers to make $295,000 per picture.
His father Charles Cooper died of pneumonia on September 18th 1946, three months after Gary completed Cloak and Dagger (1946) and 3 days after his father's 81st birthday.
Starred in two movies with Teresa Wright, The Pride of the Yankees (1942) and Casanova Brown (1944).
Sam Wood directed him in four movies, The Pride of the Yankees (1942), For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943), Casanova Brown (1944) and Saratoga Trunk (1945).
Cecil B. DeMille directed him in The Plainsman (1936), North West Mounted Police (1940), The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944) and Unconquered (1947).
Frank Capra directed him in two movies, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) and Meet John Doe (1941).
Appeared in four movies with Fay Wray, The First Kiss (1928), The Legion of the Condemned (1928), The Texan (1930), One Sunday Afternoon (1933).
Appeared in two movies with Marlene Dietrich, Morocco (1930) and Desire (1936).
Howard Hawks directed him in three movies, Today We Live (1933), Ball of Fire (1941) and Sergeant York (1941).
Appeared in three movies with Barbara Stanwyck, Ball of Fire (1941), Meet John Doe (1941) and Blowing Wild (1953).
Appeared in eight movies with Walter Brennan. These were Watch Your Wife (1926), The Wedding Night (1935), The Cowboy and the Lady (1938), The Westerner (1940), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942) and Task Force (1949).
In 1951, after 25 years in show business, his professional reputation declined, and he was dropped from the Motion Picture Herald's list of the top 10 Box Office performers. In the following year he made a big comeback at the age of fifty-one with High Noon (1952).
Took an acting class from Michael Chekhov
He turned down both Stagecoach (1939) and Gone with the Wind (1939).
He wasn't present to receive his Academy Award in February 1953, for his portrayal of Marshal Will Kane in High Noon (1952). He asked John Wayne to accept it on his behalf.
He left America and Hollywood and didn't return for 18 months. During that time he was in Hawaii, Mexico and France and shot four films: Return to Paradise (1953), Blowing Wild (1953), Garden of Evil (1954) and Vera Cruz (1954).
He formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, in 1958. In 1959 the company made three of his more unusual films: The Hanging Tree (1959), They Came to Cordura (1959) and The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959).
Was romantically linked with Marlene Dietrich
Was very good friends with Ernest Hemingway for twenty years. Hemingway shot himself a month after Cooper's death.
He declined roles in The Big Trail (1930), Stagecoach (1939) and Red River (1948). All of these were subsequently played by John Wayne, whom he met and befriended on the set of Operation Pacific (1951) while Cooper was visiting his mistress, Patricia Neal.
Both of his parents were immigrants to America from England.
On 16 April 1958 he entered the Manhattan Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital for a full face-lift and other cosmetic surgery by Dr John Converse, one of the leading plastic surgeons in America. Newspaper articles commenting on the effects of the operation said his face now looked quite different and the procedure had not been successful.
His shot from High Noon (1952) was used as a Solidarity candidates trademark of the first independent elections in Poland in June 1989 ("There's a new sheriff in town")
In the spring of 1960 he had two operations, one for prostate cancer and then after that a part of his colon removed which was cancerous also. The doctors were sure that they had gotten all of it. His body strengthened and he made the movie The Naked Edge (1961) in England, but while he was making this film he had a lot of pain in his neck and shoulders. When he returned home from England he went back to the doctor and it was then that he had to be told the cancer had metastasized to his lungs and bones. As he did in The Pride of the Yankees (1942) he took it in his stride and said, "If it is God's will, that's all right too." He opted not to take very much treatment.
His reputation as an unthinking conservative seems largely undeserved. Though he appeared as a "friendly witness" before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in 1947, he carefully avoided naming any people he suspected of having Communist sympathies within the Hollywood community. He later starred in High Noon (1952), a western that was an allegory for blacklisting in Hollywood, and strongly defended blacklisted screenwriter Carl Foreman from attacks by the right-wing Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals. Foreman later credited Cooper as the only major star in Hollywood who tried to help him. His mistress Patricia Neal, who did consider herself a liberal, said Gary was "conservative" but "you couldn't call him right-wing". Cooper showed a sense of humor by asking John Wayne to collect his Oscar for him in 1953, after Wayne had criticized High Noon (1952) as "anti-American".
After James Stewart revealed to the world that Cooper was dying of cancer, messages poured in from such friends and well-wishers as Pope John XXIII, former Vice President Richard Nixon, Henry Fonda, Pablo Picasso, Queen Elizabeth II of England, Princess Grace (_Grace Kelly (I)' ) of Monaco, John Wayne, Ernest Hemingway, former President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Bob Hope, Henry Hathaway, Audrey Hepburn, Mel Ferrer, William Goetz, Mary Livingstone(Mrs. Jack Benny) and Jack Benny, Gloria Stewart (Mrs. James Stewart) and James Stewart, Charles Feldman and Constance and Jerry Wald. The newly inaugurated President John F. Kennedy called from Washington and couldn't get through on the busy Cooper phone, but kept calling. He got through on the second day to talk to Gary for seven minutes.
The pallbearers at the funeral were Cooper's close friends - James Stewart, Henry Hathaway, Jack Benny, William Goetz, Jerry Wald, and Charles Feldman. Rocky and Maria walked behind the casket, alongside Cooper's 87-year-old mother Alice and his brother Arthur, as it was borne through the church to the hearse out on Santa Monica Boulevard. Among the top names of Hollywood attending the services were Norma Shearer, Dean Martin, Walter Pidgeon, Buddy Rogers, Marlene Dietrich, Randolph Scott, Joel McCrea, Frank Sinatra, Burt Lancaster, Jimmy Durante, Martha Hyer, John Wayne, Rosalind Russell, Robert Stack, Maureen O'Sullivan, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Fred Astaire, Bob Hope, Dinah Shore, and Karl Malden. Not one fan broke the lines to ask for an autograph.
Along with Sidney Poitier, is the most represented actor on the American Film Institute's 100 Most Inspiring Movies of All Time, with five of his films on the list. They are: Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) at #83, Sergeant York (1941) at #57, Meet John Doe (1941) at #49, High Noon (1952)_ at #27, and The Pride of the Yankees (1942) at #22.
At the time of his terminal cancer being diagnosed towards the end of 1960, Cooper had signed to star in The Sundowners (1960) and Ride the High Country (1962).
