Anthony Perkins mini-bio: Anthony Perkins (April 4, 1932 – September 12, 1992) was an American actor best known for his role as the serial killer Norman Bates in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960). He was the son of American stage and film actor Osgood Perkins and Janet Esseltyn Rane. Perkins' first movie was The Actress (1953); he received an Academy Award nomination for his role in his second film, Friendly Persuasion (1956). After other acclaimed performances both in film and on Broadway, he starred as Norman Bates in the 1960 film Psycho. Many people feel he deserved to win an Oscar for this role[citation needed], but he was not nominated. Following the success of Psycho, he did have a decade-long successful career in Europe, where many fans did not associate Perkins with the typecasting image of Norman Bates.
Perkins went on to create a critically-lauded portrayal of Joseph K. in Orson Welles' The Trial (1962) a cinematic adaptation of the novel by Franz Kafka. Upon returning to America, he took the role of a disturbed young murderer in Pretty Poison (1968), which served to affect the rest of his career. He starred in the sequels and prequel to Psycho, including Psycho II, Psycho III (which he directed) and Psycho IV: The Beginning. He also played a few memorable characters, such as the chaplain in Catch-22 (1970). Despite these successes, most of his later work was made-for-TV movies. Perkins also co-wrote, with composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim, the screenplay for the 1973 film The Last of Sheila, for which they received a 1974 Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for Best Motion Picture Screenplay. Among his Broadway credits are the Frank Loesser musical Greenwillow (1960) and Bernard Slade's 1979 play Romantic Comedy opposite Mia Farrow. Perkins's life was meticulously documented in the biography Anthony Perkins: Split Image by Charles Winecoff (Alyson Books, 2006).
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