Bonar Colleano

Colleano was born Bonar Sullivan in New York City. He had childhood experiences with the Ringling Brothers Circus and in his family's famous circus.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article42506184 |title=STARS OF TIGHTROPE |newspaper=Cairns Post |issue=13,867 |location=Queensland |date=13 August 1946 |accessdate=27 September 2017 |page=4 |via=National Library of Australia}}

He moved to the United Kingdom when he was 12 so his family could appear at the London Palladium.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article103925805 |title=POOL OF LONDON |newspaper=Western Herald |location=New South Wales |date=10 April 1953 |accessdate=27 September 2017 |page=10 |via=National Library of Australia}} He spent several years performing in music halls. When war broke out in 1939, he began entertaining troops in Britain and was not called up for either nation's military forces.{{cite web|last=Williams|first=Tony|title=The Importance of Being Bonar|url=http://www.wetdryvac.net/November3rdClub/2007/08-07/nonfiction/williams.html|work=The November 3rd Club|accessdate=January 16, 2016|archive-date=24 July 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150724072143/http://www.wetdryvac.net/November3rdClub/2007/08-07/nonfiction/williams.html|url-status=dead}} In 1941 he was in a revue Piccadixie.EDINBURGH THEATRES: LYCEUM: "Smilin' Through"

The Scotsman 26 Aug 1941: 3.

Colleano's first important role came with the popular wartime drama The Way to the Stars (also known as Johnny in the Clouds, 1945), playing an American airman.

He played American servicemen in Wanted for Murder (1946), A Matter of Life and Death (1946), and While the Sun Shines (1947).

Colleano played an Italian in One Night with You (1948), and was in Good-Time Girl (1948) and Sleeping Car to Trieste (1948) and "Broken Journey" (1948). He worked regularly in radio, appearing in a revue Navy Mixture,{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article161316314 |title=No title |newspaper=The National Advocate |location=New South Wales |date=18 September 1947 |accessdate=27 September 2017 |page=5 |via=National Library of Australia}} and had a lead part in Once a Jolly Swagman (1949).

Colleano's reputation shot up when cast in the role of Stanley Kowalski in the original English stage production of A Streetcar Named Desire (1949) at the Aldwych Theatre, London, directed by Laurence Olivier and co-starring Vivien Leigh.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article229232580 |title=A Streetcar Named Desire |newspaper=The Sun |issue=2430 |location=New South Wales |date=6 November 1949 |accessdate=27 September 2017 |page=5 |via=National Library of Australia}}

His film parts got better. Give Us This Day (1949) was set in the U.S. but shot in England. He was a romantic lead in Dance Hall (1950).

It led to lead roles in films starting with Pool of London (1951) and A Tale of Five Cities (1952). The latter enabled him to display some of his circus skills.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article82757109 |title=CIRCUS STAR IN FIRST FILM |newspaper=Singleton Argus |location=New South Wales |date=14 May 1951 |accessdate=27 September 2017 |page=3 |via=National Library of Australia}} He went to the US and starred in a Hollywood production, Stanley Kramer's Eight Iron Men (1952).Over There

Horton, Robert. Film Comment; New York Vol. 54, Iss. 5, (Sep/Oct 2018): 18-19.

He went back to Britain to play the lead in Is Your Honeymoon Really Necessary? (1953), a comedy with Diana Dors, and in Escape by Night (1953).

Colleano had another Hollywood role, a support, in Flame and the Flesh (1954), shot in England and Italy.

He went back to support parts in British films with Time Is My Enemy (1954) and The Sea Shall Not Have Them (1955).

Colleano had good support roles in the oddball Shakespeare derivation Joe MacBeth (1955) and Stars in Your Eyes (1956).

Warwick Productions used him in Zarak (1956). They liked his work and kept him on for Interpol (1957), Fire Down Below (1957), No Time to Die (1958) and The Man Inside (1958). He was also in Death Over My Shoulder (1958).

Colleano was from a well-known Australian circus family and was a nephew of Con Colleano, the first tightrope walker to perform a forward somersault on the wire. In 1946, he married actress Tamara Lees, but the couple divorced in 1951. His second wife was actress Susan Shaw, who descended into alcoholism after his death. Their son Mark Colleano is also an actor.{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/december/15/newsid_3245000/3245079.stm|accessdate=January 16, 2016|work=BBC News|title=1958: Film stars raise cash for Colleano|date=15 December 1958}} In 1950, while living in the U.K., he fathered future Average White Band drummer Robbie McIntosh. Colleano was not married to McIntosh's mother.

Colleano died in 1958 at the age of 34, when he crashed his sports car (a Jaguar XK140) in Birkenhead shortly after leaving the Queensway Tunnel.{{cite web|url=http://www.entertainmentcalendar.com.au/article/bonar-colleano/|accessdate=January 16, 2016|work=Entertainment Calendar|title=Bonar Colleano|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170110015505/http://www.entertainmentcalendar.com.au/article/bonar-colleano/|archive-date=January 10, 2017|url-status=dead}} He was driving back from Liverpool's New Shakespeare Theatre, where he had been appearing in a stage production of Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?. His passenger, fellow actor and friend Michael Balfour, required 98 stitches, but eventually recovered.The life and Wild times of Bonar Colleano

Author: Cecil Wilson Date: Monday, Aug. 18, 1958

Publication: Daily Mail (London, England) Issue: 19385 p3

In the lyrics of Ian Dury and the Blockheads' 1979 song "Reasons to Be Cheerful, Part 3", Colleano was included in the list of reasons to be cheerful.

How a Star Gets in Trouble over Tax Author: By Daily Mail Reporter Date: Wednesday, May 21, 1958 Publication: Daily Mail (London, England) Issue: 19309 p 3{{Reflist|30em}}

• {{cite book|title=Halliwell's Who's Who in the Movies|publisher=Harper Collins|year=2001|isbn=0-06-093507-3}}

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• The Importance of Being Bonar https://web.archive.org/web/20080407000529/http://www.november3rdclub.com/08-07/nonfiction/williams.html
• {{Find a Grave|10348118}}

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Category:1924 births

Category:1958 deaths

Category:American male film actors

Category:American male stage actors

Category:Male actors from New York City

Category:Road incident deaths in England

Category:American people of Australian descent

Category:American emigrants to England

Category:American music hall performers

Category:20th-century American male actors