Ralph Meeker

Acting · Born 1920-11-21 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA

Biography

Ralph Meeker (born Ralph Rathgeber; November 21, 1920 – August 5, 1988) was an American actor. He first rose to prominence for his roles in the Broadway productions of Mister Roberts (1948–1951) and Picnic (1953), the former of which earned him a Theatre World Award for his performance. In film, Meeker is perhaps best known for his portrayal of Mike Hammer in Robert Aldrich's 1955 Kiss Me Deadly. Meeker went on to play a series of roles that used his husky and macho screen presence, including a lead role in Stanley Kubrick's military courtroom drama Paths of Glory (1957), as a troubled mechanic opposite Carroll Baker in Something Wild (1961), as a World War II captain in The Dirty Dozen (1967), and in the gangster film The St. Valentine's Day Massacre (1967). Other credits include…

Filmography

• Paths of Glory as Cpl. Philippe Paris
• The Dirty Dozen as Captain Stuart Kinder
• The Naked Spur as Roy Anderson
• The Anderson Tapes as Police Captain 'Iron Balls' Delaney
• Run of the Arrow as Lieutenant Driscoll
• A Woman's Devotion as Trevor Stevenson
• The Alpha Incident as Charlie
• Jeopardy as Lawson the Fugitive
• Winter Kills as Gameboy Baker
• The Food of the Gods as Bensington