Career
Born Paul Douglas Fleischer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he was originally an announcer for CBS radio station WCAU in that city, relocating to network headquarters in New York in 1934. Douglas co-hosted CBS's popular swing music program, The Saturday Night Swing Club, from 1936 to 1939.
He made his Broadway debut in 1936 as the Radio Announcer in Doty Hobart and Tom McKnight's Double Dummy at the John Golden Theatre. In 1946 he won both a Theatre World Award and a Clarence Derwent Award for his portrayal of Harry Brock in Garson Kanin's Born Yesterday.
Douglas began appearing in films in 1949. He may be best remembered for two baseball comedy movies, Angels in the Outfield (1951) and It Happens Every Spring (1949). He also played Richard Widmark's police partner in the 1950 thriller Panic in the Streets, frustrated newlywed Porter Hollingsway in A Letter to Three Wives (1949), Sgt. Kowalski in The Big Lift (1950), businessman Josiah Walter Dudley in Executive Suite (1954) and a con man turned monk in When in Rome (1952). Douglas was host of the 22nd annual Academy Awards in March 1950. Continuing in radio, he was the announcer for The Ed Wynn Show, and the first host of NBC Radio's The Horn & Hardart Children's Hour. In April 1959 Douglas appeared in The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour as Lucy Ricardo's television morning show boss in the episode "Lucy Wants a Career".
Douglas was originally cast in the 1960 episode of The Twilight Zone called "The Mighty Casey", a role written for him by Rod Serling based on his character in Angels in the Outfield, but Douglas died the day after production of the episode had been completed. His role was taken over by Jack Warden, and most of the episode was refilmed several months later.
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Famous quotes containing the word career:
“I seemed intent on making it as difficult for myself as possible to pursue my “male” career goal. I not only procrastinated endlessly, submitting my medical school application at the very last minute, but continued to crave a conventional female role even as I moved ahead with my “male” pursuits.”
—Margaret S. Mahler (1897–1985)
“I’ve been in the twilight of my career longer than most people have had their career.”
—Martina Navratilova (b. 1956)
“It is a great many years since at the outset of my career I had to think seriously what life had to offer that was worth having. I came to the conclusion that the chief good for me was freedom to learn, think, and say what I pleased, when I pleased. I have acted on that conviction... and though strongly, and perhaps wisely, warned that I should probably come to grief, I am entirely satisfied with the results of the line of action I have adopted.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)