Ben Lyon

From Wikipedia Ben Lyon February 6 1901 March 22 1979 was an American actor and a studio executive at 20th Century Fox Born in Atlanta Georgia Lyon entered films in 1918 after a successful appearance on Broadway opposite Jeanne Eagels He attracted attention in the highly successful film Flaming Youth 1923 and steadily developed into a leading man He was most successfully paired with some of the leading actresses of the silent era including Pola Negri Gloria Swanson Colleen Moore Barbara La Marr Viola Dana Anna Q Nilsson Mary Astor and Blanche Sweet He had success as an actor in the 1930 film Hells Angels The film was a major success and brought Jean Harlow to prominence but Lyons performance as an heroic World War I aviator was also highly regarded For the next decade he was constantly in demand but his popularity began to wane by the early 1940s By the mid1940s he was working for 20th Century Fox On July 17 1946 he met a young aspiring actress named Norma Jeane Dougherty2 After his first meeting with her he stated that she was Jean Harlow all over again He organized a color screen test for the actress renamed her and finally signed her as Marilyn Monroe to her first studio contract During World War II Lyons and his wife actress Bebe Daniels settled in London The couple along with the comedian Vic Oliver starred in the radio series Hi Gang which ran from 1940 to 1949 Hi Gang was succeeded in 1950 by Life with the Lyons which also featured their real life son Richard and daughter Barbara and had a run on BBC and independent television from 1954 until 1960 Lyon married actress Bebe Daniels in June 1930 They had two children daughter Barbara in 1932 and a son Richard whom they adopted Daniels suffered a severe stroke in 1963 and withdrew from public life She suffered a second stroke in late 1970 She died at the couples London home in March 1971 In 1974 Lyon married the actress Marian Nixon whom he had known since the 1920s On March 22 1979 Lyon and his second wife Marian Nixon were vacationing together on the Queen Elizabeth 2 cruise ship near Honolulu Hawaii when Lyon suffered a fatal heart attack He is interred in the Chapel Columbarium at Hollywood Forever Cemetery next to his first wife Bebe For his contribution to the motion picture industry Ben Lyon has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1724 Vine Street