(1898 – 1987) Scott was raised in Charlotte, North Carolina. After service with the U.S. Army, he attended Georgia Institute of Technology but, after being injured playing football, transferred to the University of North Carolina.
He discovered acting and went to California, where he was hired to voice coach Gary Cooper for The Virginian (1929). Paramount offered him a contract where he met Cary Grant, another Paramount contract player, on the set of Hot Saturday (1932) and the pair soon moved in together.
Their on-and-off living arrangement would last until 1942.
Scott moved into leading roles at Paramount, but it was not until he began focusing on Westerns in the late 1940s that he reached his greatest stardom. He became one of the top box office stars of the 1950s and, in the Westerns of Budd Boetticher especially, an important figure. Following a critically acclaimed role in one of the classics of the genre, Ride the High Country (1962), Scott retired from films.
He died in 1987 and is buried in Charlotte, North Carolina.
