Granger, (James Lablache) Stewart (1913–1993)

English film actor. After several leading roles in British romantic melodramas during World War II, such as The Man in Grey (1940), he moved to Hollywood in 1950 and appeared in such films as Scaramouche (1952), The Prisoner of Zenda (1952), Beau Brummel (1954), and Moonfleet (1955).

Granger was born in London, where work as a film extra led him to drama school, repertory, and the West End stage. His first film was in 1940, and after being invalided out of the army, he starred in a succession of British films, almost always in heroic roles. Tall and dark with classical features, he went on to Hollywood, where his egotism made him unpopular. He reputedly turned down the male lead in A Star Is Born (1954), which in the event was a high point in the career of his close friend James Mason. Some of Granger's performances tended to inflexibility, and hardly any of his films made after 1960 rose above the level of potboilers. By 1978 he was reduced to a minor supporting role in The Wild Geese. He returned to the theatre in 1990, appearing in a revival of The Circle on Broadway in New York, and on an English tour.