All All. Sign In. This list only refers to the 'Best Actor' category and does not take into account any nominations received in the 'Best Supporting Actor' category. List activity. Spencer Tracy. Tracy was still at Norfolk Navy Yard in Virginia at the end of the war. After playing the lead in the play "The Truth" at Ripon College he decided that acting might be his career.
In both got nonspeaking parts as robots in "R. Making very little money in stock, Tracy supported himself with jobs as bellhop, janitor and salesman until John Ford saw his critically acclaimed performance in the lead role in the play "The Last Mile" later played on film by Clark Gable and signed him for The William Fox Film Company's production of Up the River Despite appearing in sixteen films at that studio over the next five years, Tracy was never able to rise to full film star status there, in large part because the studio was unable to match his talents to suitable story material.
During that period the studio itself floundered, eventually merging with Darryl F. He became the first actor to win back-to-back Best Actor Oscars for Captains Courageous and, in a project he initially didn't want to star in, Boys Town Tracy had a brief romantic relationship with Loretta Young in the mids, and a lifelong one with Katharine Hepburn beginning in after they were first paired in Woman of the Year by director George Stevens.
Tracy's strong Roman Catholic beliefs precluded his divorcing wife Louise, though they mostly lived apart. Tracy suffered from severe alcoholism and diabetes from the late s , which led to his declining several tailor-made roles in films that would become big hits with other actors in those roles. Although his drinking problems were well known, he was considered peerless among his colleagues Tracy had a well-deserved reputation for keeping co-stars on their toes for his oddly endearing scene-stealing tricks , and remained in demand as a senior statesman who nevertheless retained box office clout.
Two weeks after completion of Stanley Kramer 's Guess Who's Coming to Dinner , during which he suffered from lung congestion, Spencer Tracy died of a heart attack.
