This card celebrates Lew Ayres, who was born in December 1908 - but also our set, which was born in December 1934.
And this closes the book on at least the three home issues of this set, for it means we have featured Series One, Series Two, and Series Three.
Lewis Frederick Ayres III was born in Minneapolis, America, on December the twenty-eighth, 1908. His parents divorced when he was still young and he moved to California with his mother and what are described as half-siblings. Maybe that is a clue to the divorce.
At first our man wanted to be a musician, in fact he worked with several big bands, and they sometimes supplied the music for films, which seems to have given him the idea to act, as well, for he seems to have never completely given up being a musician. Anyway he was reputedly spotted at a nightclub, perhaps whilst he was performing as a musician, and given a screen test to co-star with Great Garbo in "The Kiss", released in 1929. Two other films were released in that year, in which he was but an extra, and unbilled, which might at first suggest that these must have been made before his starring role - they were "Big News" and "Compromised". However, investigating "The Kiss" unearths the fact that he was not the star of that film at all, he played a teenager that she meets, quite innocently, at a dog show, though he did get fifth billing on the screen credits. And he must have been even slightly memorable, as from that film he was cast in one of his greatest roles.
That film was "All Quiet on the Western Front", released in 1930. He was billed as Lewis Ayres, and he played a German soldier, but it was very much an anti-war film, and the theme stayed with him - he was a conscientious objector throughout the Second World War, serving as a medic and chaplain`s assistant, though he still went out to the Pacific, where he was often under heavy attack. He also gave every penny of his war wages to the American Red Cross.
Immediately after "All Quiet on the Western Front" was made, he moved from Universal Studios to Fox, and then to Republic, because they offered him a chance as a director. But he soon left, for Paramount, and then to M.G.M., which he joined in 1938. There he was given the chance to bring Max Brandt`s very popular 1930s hospital novels to the screen, which he did, very successfully, for nine films, and then again in the 1950s on radio. The first of these was "Young Doctor Kildare", in 1938.
By this time he had been married twice. His first wife was actress Lola Lane, they were wed from 1931 until 1933, though by all reports they were seldom together. He then married Ginger Rogers, in 1934, but that only lasted two years, though they did not formally divorce until 1940.
After the Second World War he returned to films. and then to television. He was also offered the chance to bring Dr. Kildare to the small screen, but he refused. This may have been because he was offered the part that would eventually be given to Raymond Massey, though there is another story that he was opposed to the cigarette advertising which was part of the show. He did appear on almost every television show you could think of as a guest star, right into the 1990s.
And he also married again, in 1964, this time more successfully, to Diana Hall, to whom he remained wed until his death, aged eighty-eight years and two days, on December the thirtieth, 1996. They also had a son, his only child, born in 1968.
This second series is described in our original reference book to the issues of John Player & Sons (RB.17, published in 1950) as :
- 91. Second 50 Subjects. Film Stars, "Second Series". Adhesive backs. .
A. Home issue, with Album clause "price one penny". Issued December, 1934
B. Irish issue, with Album clause without price. Issued November 1935
By the time of our World Tobacco Issues Index, just six years later, it is described as :
- FILM STARS. Sm. Nd. ... P72-162
2. Inscribed "Second Series". (50)
A. Home issue, album wording with price "one penny"
B. Irish issue, album wording without price
That remains identical in our updated World Tobacco Issues Index, save the card code, which is now P644-328.2.A