Phillips Holmes

Phillips Raymond Holmes (July 22, 1907 – August 12, 1942) was an American actor. For his contributions to the film industry, he was posthumously given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1960.

Born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, the son of Edna Phillips and stage star Taylor Holmes, Holmes enjoyed a privileged childhood and received his education at Trinity College, Cambridge, the University of Grenoble and a year at Princeton University where he was spotted in the undergraduate crowd during the filming of Frank Tuttle's Varsity in 1928 and offered a screen test. In the early 1930s, he became a popular leading man, playing leads in a few important productions, notably in Josef von Sternberg's An American Tragedy (1931) and Ernst Lubitsch's Broken Lullaby (1932).

At Paramount, he starred in melodrama and comedy. In 1933, his contract with Paramount ran out and he moved to MGM for one year. As the decade progressed, Holmes' career declined, and he appeared in a few box-office failures, including Sam Goldwyn's poorly received Nana (1934). His last American movie was General Spanky (1936). In 1938, he appeared in two UK movies. Housemaster was his last film, and he returned to acting on stage in the United States.

In 1933, Holmes was driving with actress Mae Clarke when he crashed into a parked car. Clarke, who suffered a broken jaw and facial cuts, sued Holmes for US$21,500 (equivalent to $486,044 in 2022), claiming that he had been driving while drunk. Clarke dropped the suit when Holmes agreed to pay her medical expenses. The changes in her face adversely affected her burgeoning career in the long run (in 1931, she had played both Victor Frankenstein's bride in Frankenstein and was the recipient of half a grapefruit in the face from James Cagney in The Public Enemy).

At the start of World War II, he joined the Royal Canadian Air Force. He was killed in a mid-air collision in northwest Ontario, Canada.

Holmes has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.