Fernando Rey

Dapper, durable international star, a leading man in his native Spain who played prominent roles in a wide variety of European and American features. An architecture student when the Spanish Civil War broke out, Rey saw his father, who fought for the Loyalists against Franco, sentenced to death (the sentence was later suspended). He also saw his family's wealth dwindle away and then became involved with the fighting as well. Needing money, Rey drifted into film work as an extra and kept busy dubbing voices from foreign films into Spanish, in several films as the voice of Laurence Olivier. Getting acting roles in the mid-1940s, the actor enjoyed success the following decade, performing for such leading Spanish directors as Juan Antonio Bardem and Luis Berlanga.