Gene Nelson

Acting

Gene Nelson

Born 1920-03-24 · Astoria, Oregon, USA

Gene Nelson was an American dancer, actor, screenwriter, and director. Born Leander Eugene Berg in Astoria, Oregon, his family moved to Seattle when he was a year old. He was inspired to become a dancer by watching Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers when he was a child. After serving in the Army during World War II during which he also performed in the musical This Is the Army, Nelson landed his first Broadway role in Lend an Ear, for which he received the Theatre World Award. He also appeared onstage in Follies, which garnered him a Tony Award nomination, and Good News. Nelson's longtime professional dance partner during the 1950s was actress JoAnn Dean Killingsworth. Gene Nelson co-starred with Doris Day in "Lullaby of Broadway" in 1951. He played Will Parker in the film Oklahoma! In 1959, he appeared in Northwest Passage as a young man trying to prove his innocence in a murder case. Nelson appeared on the March 17, 1960 episode of "You Bet Your Life", hosted by Groucho Marx. He and Groucho's daughter, Melinda, performed a dance number together. Nelson directed eight episodes of The Rifleman in the 1961-62 season, the original Star Trek, the first season of I Dream of Jeannie, Gunsmoke, The Silent Force, and The San Pedro Beach Bums. He directed the Elvis Presley films Kissin' Cousins, which screenplay he wrote, and Harum Scarum. For the Kissin' Cousins screenplay he received a WGA award nomination for best written musical. He later taught in the Theater Arts Department at San Francisco State University in the late 1980s. He starred as Buddy in the 1971 Broadway musical Follies, for which he received a 1972 Tony Award nomination for Featured Actor In A Musical. The production featured a score by Stephen Sondheim and was co-directed by Michael Bennett and Harold Prince. For contribution to the motion picture industry, in 1990, Nelson was inducted into the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Nelson's star is located at 7005 Hollywood Boulevard. Description above from the Wikipedia article Gene Nelson, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.​

Acting credits

Apartment for Peggy poster
8.2

Professor Henry Barnes decides he's lived long enough and contemplates suicide. His attitude is changed by Peggy Taylor, a chipper young mother-to-be who charms him into renting out his attic as an apartment for her and her husband Jason, a former GI struggling to finish college.

Apartment for Peggy

1948

Timeslip poster
5.8

An atomic scientist is found floating in a river with a bullet in his back and a radioactive halo around his body. The radioactivity has put him seven-and-a-half seconds ahead of us in time. He teams up with a reporter to stop his evil double from destroying his experiments in artificial tungsten.

Timeslip

1955

Oklahoma! poster
6.6

There's a box social coming up, and Curly asks Laurey if she'll be his date. Trouble is, Laurey thinks he's waited too long, and in a fit of pique accepts an offer from the boorish ranch hand Jud instead. Meanwhile, Laurey's friend Ado Annie is also torn between two men: cowboy Will and foreign peddler Ali Hakim. Both women struggle to know their own hearts before it's too late.

Oklahoma!

1955

Crime Wave poster
7.1

Reformed parolee Steve Lacey is caught in the middle when a wounded former cellmate seeks him out for shelter. The other two former cellmates then attempt to force him into doing a bank job.

Crime Wave

1953

I Wonder Who's Kissing Her Now poster
7.5

A biopic of the career of Joe Howard (12 Feb.,1878 - 19 May, 1961), famous songwriter of the early 20th Century. Howard wrote the title song, Goodbye, My Lady Love; and Hello, My Baby among many others. Mark Stevens was dubbed by Buddy Clark, well known singer of the 30's and 40's

I Wonder Who's Kissing Her Now

1947

S.O.B. poster
6.0

A movie producer who made a huge flop tries to salvage his career by revamping his film as an erotic production, where its family-friendly star takes her top off.

S.O.B.

1981

Tea for Two poster
6.1

In this reworking of "No, No, Nanette," wealthy heiress Nanette Carter bets her uncle $25,000 that she can say "no" to everything for 48 hours. If she wins, she can invest the money in a Broadway show featuring songs written by her beau, and of course, in which she will star. Trouble is, she doesn't realize her uncle's been wiped out by the Stock Market crash.

Tea for Two

1950

So This Is Paris poster
9.0

Three sailors on leave head for Paris with one thing on their minds.

So This Is Paris

1954

This Is the Army poster
5.7

In WW I dancer Jerry Jones stages an all-soldier show on Broadway, called Yip Yip Yaphank. Wounded in the War, he becomes a producer. In WW II his son Johnny Jones, who was before his fathers assistant, gets the order to stage a knew all-soldier show, called THIS IS THE ARMY. But in his pesonal life he has problems, because he refuses to marry his fiancée until the war is over.

This Is the Army

1943

Lullaby of Broadway poster
6.0

Pretty Melinda Howard has been abroad singing with a musical troupe. She decides to return home to surprise her mother whom she thinks is a successful Broadway star with a mansion in Manhattan. She doesn't know that her mother is actually a burnt-out cabaret singer with a love for whiskey. When she arrives at the mansion, she is taken in by the two servants who are friends of her mother's. The house actually belongs to Adolph Hubbell, a kind-hearted Broadway producer who also gets drawn into the charade. Hubbell takes a shine to Melinda and agrees to star her in his next show. Melinda also finds romance with a handsome hoofer who's also in the show. All is going well for Melinda except that she wants to see her mother who keeps putting off their reunion.

Lullaby of Broadway

1951

The Walls of Jericho poster
5.6

In a small town in Kansas, a county attorney in an unhappy marriage falls in love with another woman.

The Walls of Jericho

1948

The West Point Story poster
5.8

A Broadway director helps the West Point cadets put on a show, aided by two lovely ladies and assorted complications.

The West Point Story

1950

Family Flight poster
5.4

A bitterly divided family is forced to cooperate when their holiday plane crash-lands in the California wilderness. Overcoming their differences, they concentrate on repairing the plane and attempt to build a makeshift runway which will help them escape the unforgiving terrain.

Family Flight

1972

Second Fiddle poster
5.1

Studio publicist discovers Minnesota skating teacher and takes her to Hollywood. She goes back to Minnesota but he follows her.

Second Fiddle

1939

Thunder Island poster
5.4

A hit man hijacks a boat — and the married couple aboard — in order to carry out a contract on a dictator in the Caribbean.

Thunder Island

1963

She's Working Her Way Through College poster
5.4

Shapely burlesque dancer Hot Garters Gertie aka Angela Gardner meets her future drama professor. Her new landlady proves to be the professor's wife. Angela helps breath life into the annual school stage show...but someone has discovered her secret past.

She's Working Her Way Through College

1952

Everything Happens at Night poster
5.3

Two reporters compete to discover a scientist living in hiding and win his daughter.

Everything Happens at Night

1939

Three Sailors and a Girl poster
7.0

A group of sailors invest in a musical revue.

Three Sailors and a Girl

1953

Painting the Clouds with Sunshine poster
6.0

The story of three gold-digging ladies searching for millionaires. A loose remake of Gold Diggers of 1933.

Painting the Clouds with Sunshine

1951

Starlift poster
6.6

To impress a movie star, a U.S. Air Force crewman pretends he is soon to see combat. When his lie gets out, chaos ensues.

Starlift

1951

A Brand New Life poster
9.0

After 18 years of marriage, a middle-aged couple has to face the prospect of having their first child.

A Brand New Life

1973

The Purple Hills poster
7.0

When a bounty hunter kills an outlaw for the reward, he has to deal with both a man falsely claiming he made the kill, and the revengeful brother of the dead man.

The Purple Hills

1961

She's Back on Broadway poster
6.0

When Catherine Terris's career in Hollywood hits the skids, she heads back to the site of her first great triumphs...Broadway! She takes the lead in a play which is being directed by Gordon Evans, the man who was both her Svengali and her lover. Evans is still bitter that she walked out on him to become the toast of Hollywood years earlier. Can Terris and Evans put aside their mutual animosity long enough to make a go of this production. The way things start off, it doesn't seem likely.

She's Back on Broadway

1953

The Daughter of Rosie O'Grady poster
7.0

An Irish horsecar driver's daughter meets New York showman Tony Pastor and goes into vaudeville.

The Daughter of Rosie O'Grady

1950

Behind the camera

Kissin' Cousins poster
4.7

Army officer Josh Morgan returns to the Smoky Mountains and tries to convince his kinfolk to allow a missile site to be built on their land. Once he arrives, he discovers he has a lookalike cousin.

Kissin' Cousins

1964

Kissin' Cousins poster
4.7

Army officer Josh Morgan returns to the Smoky Mountains and tries to convince his kinfolk to allow a missile site to be built on their land. Once he arrives, he discovers he has a lookalike cousin.

Kissin' Cousins

1964

Harum Scarum poster
4.8

Johnny Tyronne, action movie star and ladies' man, is traveling through the Middle East on a goodwill tour to promote his latest film. Upon arrival, however, he's kidnapped by a gang of assassins so impressed with his cinematic adventures that they want him to carry out an assassination for them.

Harum Scarum

1965

Archie poster
NR

Archie is the 1964 unsold pilot based on the Archie comic book series. The whole gang is included, Archie, Betty, Veronica, Jughead, Reggie, Mr. Weatherbee, Ms. Grundy… William Schallert (most notably the dad in The Patty Duke Show) plays Archie’s dad and Jean Vander Pyl (Wilma’s voice in The Flintstones) plays the mom.

Archie

1964

Your Cheatin' Heart poster
6.5

The story of the country and western singer Hank Williams.

Your Cheatin' Heart

1964

The Cool Ones poster
5.4

A young, millionaire rock promoter creates a new boy/girl team for his teen TV dance show. Will the ambitious go-go dancer and has-been pop star fall in love for real?

The Cool Ones

1967

Hootenanny Hoot! poster
6.0

The marriage of television director Ted Glover and television producer A.G. Bannister has gone on the rocks because she has permitted her career to take precedence over romance.

Hootenanny Hoot!

1963

Where's Everett? poster
9.0

Arnold Barker starts every day by going out on his porch to pick up the milk and the newspaper but on this day he brings in something different — an invisible alien baby who's been left on his doorstep!

Where's Everett?

1966

Hand of Death poster
4.4

A scientist spills a new serum in his lab, accidentally inhales its fumes, and turns into a murderous monster who kills anyone he touches.

Hand of Death

1962

Wake Me When the War Is Over poster
5.2

During the latter days of WWII an American Lieutenant accidentally falls out of an airplane into German territory. He is taken in by a Baroness who becomes smitten with him and doesn't want him to leave, so she doesn't tell him that the war has ended...for five years!

Wake Me When the War Is Over

1969

Wake Me When the War Is Over poster
5.2

During the latter days of WWII an American Lieutenant accidentally falls out of an airplane into German territory. He is taken in by a Baroness who becomes smitten with him and doesn't want him to leave, so she doesn't tell him that the war has ended...for five years!

Wake Me When the War Is Over

1969

The Letters poster
6.8

Story of people whose lives were changed because of a year-long delay in the delivery of some letters.

The Letters

1973