Overview (5)

Mini Bio (2)

Errol Flynn was born to parents Theodore Flynn, a respected biologist, and Marrelle Young, an adventurous young woman. Young Flynn was a rambunctious child who could be counted on to find trouble. Errol managed to have himself thrown out of every school he was enrolled in. In his late teens he set out to find gold, but instead found a series of short lived odd jobs. Information is sketchy, but the positions of police constable, sanitation engineer, treasure hunter, sheep castrator, shipmaster for hire, fisherman, and soldier seem to be among his more reputable career choices. Staying one jump ahead of the law and jealous husbands forced Flynn to England. He took up acting, a pastime he had previously stumbled into when asked to play (ironically) Fletcher Christian in a film called In the Wake of the Bounty (1933). Flynn's natural athletic talent and good looks attracted the attention of Warner Brothers and soon he was off to America. His luck held when he replaced Robert Donat in the title role of Unter Piratenflagge (1935). He quickly rocketed to stardom as the undisputed king of adventure films, a title inherited from Douglas Fairbanks, but which remains his to this day. Onscreen, he was the freedom loving rebel, a man of action who fought against injustice and won the hearts of damsels in the process. His off-screen passions; drinking, fighting, boating and sex, made his film escapades seem pale. His love life brought him considerable fame, three statutory rape trials, and a lasting memorial in the expression "In like Flynn". Serious roles eluded him, and as his lifestyle eroded his youthful good looks, his career declined. Troubles with lawsuits and the IRS plagued him at this time, eroding what little money he had saved. A few good roles did come his way late in life, however, usually aging alcoholics, almost mirror images of Flynn. He was making a name as a serious actor before his death.

- IMDb Mini Biography By: Christopher E. Appel and James Jaeger

Errol Flynn (1909-1959) was an Australian-born film star who gained fame in Hollywood in the 1930s as the screen's premier swashbuckler. Tall, athletic and exceptionally handsome, Flynn personified the cavalier adventurer in a string of immensely popular films for Warner Brothers, most often co-starring with Olivia deHavilland in such screen classics as "Captain Blood" and "The Adventures of Robin Hood."



Flynn was born in Hobart, Tasmania, the son of professor Theodore Thomson Flynn, a world renowned Marine biologist, and Lily Mary Young. After an unhappy childhood that included physical and mental abuse by his mother, Flynn ran away to New Guinea where for several years he lived a life of adventure as a copra plantation overseer, constable, gold miner and guide up the dangerous Sepik River. In 1933, back in Australia, he was cast in a low-budget film, "In the Wake of the Bounty," which gave him the idea of becoming an actor. He drifted to England where he landed work as a bit player with the Northampton Repertory Theater and, after appearing in one film, "Murder at Monte Carlo," was discovered by a Warner Brothers talent scout.



Coming to America in 1934, Flynn was cast in two insignificant films before Warner Brothers took a chance on an unknown and starred him in "Captain Blood." Flynn shot to international stardom overnight, and throughout the 1930s he was arguably the most recognizable movie star in the world. His striking good looks and screen charisma won him millions of fans, including legions of women who threw themselves at him.



Flynn also became as famous for his hedonistic lifestyle as for his swashbuckling movie roles. By his own estimate he slept with 10,000 women in his lifetime, and his penchant for alcohol, drugs and brawling aged him prematurely. By 1950 his best days were behind him both professionally and personally. Dropped by Warner Brothers in 1952, Flynn roamed the world in his yacht making substandard films abroad, as well as one short-lived television show, "The Errol Flynn Theater." Near the end of his life he returned to Hollywood where he was rediscovered; playing drunks and washed out bums, he brought a poignancy to his performances that had not been there during his glamorous heyday.



Flynn, who was married three times, died in Vancouver, British Columbia, on October 14, 1959, of a heart attack. The coroner who examined the 50-year-old actor said he had the body of an 85-year-old man.

- IMDb Mini Biography By: Charles Culbertson

Spouse (3)

Trade Mark (3)

He is considered one of the greatest movie swashbucklers of the sound period.



Usually had a moustache



His playboy lifestyle



Trivia (67)



Father, with Patrice Wymore , of Arnella (25 December 1953-21 September 1998).

In October 1997 he was ranked #70 in "Empire" (UK) magazine's "The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time" list.



It has been said that his 1959 autobiography, "My Wicked Wicked Ways," was originally to be called "In Like Me."



Was tried for statutory rape in 1942 but was acquitted, spawning the term "In Like Flynn".



When banned from drinking on a film set, he would inject oranges with vodka and eat them during his breaks.



Interred at Forest Lawn, Glendale, CA, in the Garden of Everlasting Peace.



In 1995 he was chosen by "Empire" magazine as one of the 100 Sexiest Stars in film history (#86).



The phrase "In like Flynn," stems from his 1942 trial for statutory rape.





His son Sean Flynn appeared in a few films but didn't particularly like being an actor. He switched careers and was a freelance photojournalist during the Vietnam War. He disappeared with another journalist as they followed the US Army invasion into Cambodia and both were thought to have been captured and executed by Khmer Rouge guerrillas. He is the subject of the 1981 The Clash song, "Sean Flynn."

He was voted the 55th Greatest Movie Star of all time by "Entertainment Weekly".



His father was head of the zoology department at the University of Tasmania.



He was voted the 26th Greatest Movie Star of all time by Entertainment Weekly.





It was during a Parkinson (1971) interview that his good friend David Niven revealed that during the filming of Der Verrat des Surat Khan (1936), Flynn was busy on a horse during a break applying makeup with one hand whilst holding a mirror in the other. An extra seeing this assumed (like most of the people around) that he was gay, and decided to "pock" the horse up the behind with his lance - the horse bucked, throwing Flynn to the ground. He got to his feet and asked who had done that, the extra volunteered, thinking that this would only add to his embarrassment. However, Flynn dragged him from the horse and gave him a sound beating. They were the best of friends after that.

He met his second wife while she was working at a snack counter in a courthouse during one of his rape trials.





His father, Theodore Flynn , taught biology at Queens College, Belfast.

Warner Brothers' publicity department tried to claim that he was from Ireland, when he was in fact from Tasmania, the island state off the coast of Australia.



Although only 50, he succumbed to a massive heart attack at the apartment of Dr. Grant Gould in Vancouver, Canada, while he was there to sell his yacht (The Zaca) to an old friend, George Caldough. The yacht was his "pride and joy", but due to financial difficulties he was forced to sell it and had primarily lived on it during his final years. The autopsy showed he had the body of a 75-year-old man. His liver was so badly damaged that he could only have lived for another nine to 12 months.



He was Australian by birth. His genealogy shows both British and Irish descent.





He and director Michael Curtiz made some of their best pictures together, but they despised each other and fought constantly whenever they worked together. Ironically, his first wife Lili Damita was previously briefly married to Curtiz.

Declaring to his second wife that he wanted to experience everything in life, he began dabbling in opium in the late 1940s and quickly became a full-fledged addict. His opium addiction and the effects of the alcohol that ravaged his body over the years contributed to his premature death in 1959 at only age 50.





The hit song "Errol" by Australian band Australian Crawl was about him. He is also mentioned in the songs "Blood on the Rooftops" by Genesis and "Pencil Thin Mustache" by Jimmy Buffett



His performance as Robin Hood in Die Abenteuer des Robin Hood (1938) is ranked #16 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time.



He was granted a 4-F deferment during World War II due to his weak heart, exacerbated by bouts of malaria and tuberculosis. During the filming of Der freche Kavalier (1942) he suffered a mild heart attack.

His mother had Polynesian ancestry, from Tahiti, through her four great-grandmothers--the mutineers of HMS Bounty sailed from Tahiti to Pitcairn Island, taking some Tahitian women with them. As of 2005, there were an estimated 55 descendants of the mutineers still living on Pitcairn.





Through his mother he was descended from the illegitimate daughter of an unknown mother and Sir Richard Neville, 6th Earl of Salisbury and 16th Earl Consort of Warwick, 181st Knight of the Garter. Neville in his turn was descended, through his mother, from Thomas Holland, a stepson of Edward "the Black Prince" Plantagenet, son of King Edward III of England and father of the later King Richard II. Flynn played the Black Prince in Der schwarze Prinz (1955), commonly known in the US as "The Warriors".



Probably his most uncharacteristic screen appearance occurred in Thank Your Lucky Stars (1943) when he sang and danced his way through a pub number entitled "That's What You Jolly Well Get".



In The Case of the Curious Bride (1935), one of his earliest films, his role consisted of lying on a marble slab as a corpse. There was also a flashback sequence towards the end of the film showing how Flynn was killed. The film has appeared at least twice on Turner Classic Movies during Flynn festivals despite his very limited (certainly less than two minutes) screen time.

A chain smoker, in the last year of his life he underwent hospital tests to see whether he had throat cancer.



Nearly died from food poisoning after eating uncooked ground hamburger meat mixed with raw egg yolk early in 1959.





In the early days of establishing his Hollywood career, he passed himself off as Irish in the belief that few people knew of Australia. He was born, educated and began work in Australia, later drifting between Papua New Guinea and Sydney (rumoured to have been a fighter for PNG) before stumbling on to acting. The Australian film In the Wake of the Bounty (1933) captured some attention for him in the States and so, owing enormous debts to the Australian Taxation Office, he moved to America. He said to the ATO, "I'm willing to forget if you are".



In the last two years of his life he caused a scandal by touring the world with his 15-year-old mistress Beverly Aadland , who was working as his secretary. Their affair was the subject of a 1961 book by Beverly's mother Florence Aadland entitled "The Big Love", which describes how she intentionally pushed her daughter into the affair with Flynn. This affair is the subject of the movie Mein Leben mit Robin Hood (2013).

Once stated that his only regret was his non-participation in World War II.





Became seriously ill with liver failure in 1952 while filming The Story of William Tell (1953) in Rome.

Had a vasectomy in 1955.



In his final years he suffered from Buerger's disease, acute inflammation and thrombosis (clotting) of arteries and veins of the legs, hands and feet as a result of his excessive cigarette smoking.



Best remembered by the public for his starring in swashbuckling adventure films.



The underlying causes of his death were myocardial infarction, coronary thrombosis, coronary atherosclerosis, liver degeneration, liver sclerosis and diverticulitis of the colon.





Though Flynn did most of his own stunts in Gegen alle Flaggen (1952), he balked at the one involving sliding down through a sail on a rapier blade, which was originated by Douglas Fairbanks in Der Seeräuber (1926); it was performed by a stunt double.



A recent Australian documentary on his life and career, narrated by Christopher Lee , included a film clip of Flynn being interviewed on his being nominated for the Academy Award for his critically acclaimed performance in Zwischen Madrid und Paris (1957). We are then told that the nomination "disappeared".



In the last year of his life he turned down an offer to star in a major swashbuckling series for US television in which he would play the same kind of character he had played in Unter Piratenflagge (1935), with younger stand-ins performing his stunts. "I knew it would be crap," he explained.

In his book, "My Wicked Wicked Ways" he recounted that as a young man in Papua, New Guinea, he had many adventurous jobs as a gold prospector, slave recruiter, diamond smuggler and manager of coconut and tobacco plantations, just to name a few. He also spent a short time as a cadet patrol officer until it was discovered that he had misrepresented himself. Unfortunately, his time in New Guinea came with a price. While there he contracted malaria, which would plague him for the rest of his life. It has been a matter of dispute as to whether all his stories of adventure were true, but many have concluded that even if only 25% were true, he certainly had an amazing life.



On arriving in Britain in 1933, he found an acting job with the Northampton Repertory Company, where he worked for seven months. However, it is disputed whether he performed at the 1934 Malvern Festival and in Glasgow and London's West End.



Dream project was a biopic about the notorious Australian-Irish outlaw Ned Kelly, which nearly got produced by Warner Brothers in the mid 1940s.



According to his autobiography, his mother Marelle Young was a descendant of Midshipman Edward ("Ned") Young, a Bounty mutineer who went to Pitcairn with Fletcher Christian. Young had four children with Toofaiti--Nancy, George, Robert and William--and three more with Christian's widow Mauatua--Edward, Polly and Dorothea. His descendants still live on Pitcairn, Norfolk and in New Zealand.





He was a friend of Hermann Erben --monkey expert, drug dealer, Adolf Hitler impersonator and German agent who voluntarily spent three years in a Japanese internment camp in Shanghai.

He is frequently mentioned in Marvel Comics' "X-Men" series as the idol of the character Nightcrawler.



Since he was on the May 23, 1938, cover of Life magazine, a copy of which was placed in the Westinghouse Time Capsule at the 1939 World's Fair and not to be opened for 50 centuries, he will be remembered for thousands of years to come.





Mulholland Farm, his old house, was located at 3100 Torreyson Place off Mulholland Dr., overlooking the San Fernando Valley. Originally situated on 11-1/2 acres, the house was last occupied by Ricky Nelson , who bought it for $750,000 in 1980. His twin sons, Gunnar Nelson and ;Matthew Nelson', grew up in the house and were the last people to live in it. Unfortunately, due to years of neglect, the house and other structures (a pool, barn and a casino) were demolished in 1988 and sub-divided into several smaller parcels. Justin Timberlake owns the large compound at the top of the property at the end of Torreyson Drive. On the left is the original entrance to Flynn's property, Flynn Ranch Road, but it is now gated-closed. You can catch a glimpse of Mulholland Farm in its heyday at the beginning of the short film Cruise of the Zaca (1952). TCM shows it quite frequently as filler between movies.

While looking for native agricultural laborers in New Guinea in 1933, he was pursued and nearly captured by headhunters.



Often drank two or three quarts of vodka a day.



May have had oral cancer at the time of his death. Shortly before he died he had a tumor removed from his mouth.



He usually smoked at least one pack of cigarettes a day, as well as a pipe.





During the filming of Sein letztes Kommando (1941) Errol Flynn had an off-camera fight with the legendary Native American athlete Jim Thorpe , who was working an extra. Flynn, who was in his Custer uniform, was knocked out by Thorpe with one punch.

On August 17, 2019, he was honored with a day of his film work during the Turner Classic Movies Summer Under the Stars.



His image appears on the cover of the music CD Electro Swing Fever Vol. 3 which was released in 2014.



Personal Quotes (18)

You once liked the blissful mobility, but then you wonder, who's the real you? And who's the chap on the screen? You know, I catch myself acting out my life like a goddamn script.



They've great respect for the dead in Hollywood, but none for the living.



I do what I like.



I like my whiskey old and my women young.



[last words] I've had a hell of a lot of fun and I've enjoyed every minute of it.



I can't reconcile my gross habits with my net income.



I intend to live the first half of my life. I don't care about the rest.



The public has always expected me to be a playboy, and a decent chap never lets his public down.



It isn't what they say about you, it's what they whisper.



If I have any genius it is a genius for living.



I felt like an impostor, taking all that money for reciting ten or twelve lines of nonsense a day.



Women won't let me stay single, and I won't let myself stay married.



I allow myself to be understood as a colorful fragment in a drab world.



I've made six or seven good films - the others, not so good.



My job is to defy the normal.



By instinct I'm an adventurer; by choice I'd like to be a writer; by pure, unadulterated luck, I'm an actor.



I had now made about forty-five pictures, but what had I become? I knew all too well: a phallic symbol. All over the world I was, as a name and personality, equated with sex.



I had no greatness, only a deadly fear of mediocrity.



Salary (9)