The Comeback: Best Supporting Actor, 1945

These are your nominees for Best Supporting Actor at the 18th Academy Awards:

Michael Chekhov, Spellbound

John Dall, The Corn is Green

James Dunn, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Robert Mitchum, Story of GI Joe

J. Carrol Naish, A Medal for Benny

Let's go through them one by one.

Michael Chekhov was a Russian actor and director who studied under the legendary acting teacher Stanislavski; he was also the nephew of the playwright Anton Chekhov. As an acting teacher, his work influenced Marilyn Monroe, Elia Kazan, Yul Brynner, Clint Eastwood, Johnny Depp, and more. Spellbound was his fourth Hollywood film, having come to America when "tensions" broke out in Europe. He plays Dr. Alexander Brulov, an old mentor of Ingrid Bergman’s heroine, who provides a safe haven and professional advice to help her.

John Dall was a young American stage actor who starred in both the touring and Broadway productions of The Eve of St. Mark, a performance that earned him a screen test with Warner Bros, which led to his film debut, The Corn is Green. He plays Morgan Evans, a young Welsh miner who seems consigned to a life of work and drink until he starts taking classes with the new schoolteacher Miss Moffat, who sees in him a preternatural gift for writing.

James Dunn was a born-and-bred Manhattanite who, as a child, cut classes to go to the movies; as an adult, he joined theatrical troupes and eventually landed the lead in Sweet Adeline on Broadway, which led to his contract with Fox. He made his debut as the leading man in Frank Borzage's Bad Girl, which was nominated for Best Picture and won Best Director and Best Adaptation. Despite this and a trio of hits with Shirley Temple, his star waned as he sank deeper into alcoholism. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn was his comeback film, playing the loving patriarch of an impoverished family, a struggling actor who drinks too much. He won the Academy Award.

A boxer, a steelworker, a writer, a lyricist, and an actor, Robert Mitchum had already established himself with 25 films between 1943 and 1944, including Cry 'Havoc' (uncredited), When Strangers Marry (as Bob), and Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo. Loaned by RKO to Lester Cowan, he was cast as Captain Bill Walker, a character inspired by Captain Henry T. Waskow, the subject of one of war correspondent Ernie Pyle’s more famous columns. It and many others were adapted to make up the  Story of GI Joe.

J. Carrol Naish was the definition of a character actor. Despite his purely Irish heritage, his dark, swarthy looks saw him cast as every ethnicity except Irish - Italians, Mexicans, Native Americans, Chinese, Arabs - which he portrayed in supporting parts and cameos, credited and uncredited, in a prolific career that spanned over 40 years and over 128 films! In A Medal for Benny, he plays a Paisano - "of mixed Indian and Spanish Blood" - whose ne'erdowell son is awarded a posthumous medal of bravery.

My ranking of these nominees, from fifth to first:

A Director's Debut: 1945, Part Three

February and March 1945. Overseas, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin meet for the Yalta Conference, where they plot not just peace but how to carve up the world to best satisfy their respective empires once the war ends. On his return, Roosevelt addresses Congress for what will be his last time. The Battle of Iwo Jima rages across five weeks, while the Battle of Manila lasts exactly one month and ends in liberation for the Philippines' capital. Secret negotiations between the SS and the CIA for the surrender of Axis areas begin. Tokyo is devastated in a two-day bombing raid that kills 100,000 citizens, the most destructive air attack of the War.

And back in Hollywood? Well, in March, the 17th Academy Awards are held, resulting in Going My Way winning Best Picture (and more, as you know). March also saw the feature film debut of Elia Kazan.

Kazan was no stranger to Hollywood, he already had at least two films under his belt, including Blues in the Night...but as an actor. That's what he studied at Yale, and that's what he pursued when he joined the Group Theatre in 1932 - he continued in that vocation even as he began his career as a stage director. After appearing in the film Blues in the Night in 1941, he directed the legendary original production of Thornton Wilder's The Skin of Our Teeth, starring Tallulah Bankhead and Fredric March. So, he becomes a greater director than actor, and takes the Hollywood job that still keeps him close to the spirit of New York, even if it's filmed on the Fox soundstages: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. His first film, and it wins an Oscar. But we'll get into that later this month.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn came out amid a Disney anthology, a "prestige horror" production, and Universal programmers for Abbott & Costello and Holmes & Watson. See for yourself: