Ralph Bellamy, the character actor of stage and film, began his career in 1922, when he joined a traveling troupe of Shakespearean players. Later that same year, Bellamy performed in stock and repertory theaters with the Chautauqua Road Company. In 1929 he made his Broadway debut in Town Boy, followed by a screen debut in 1931 in The Secret Six. In 1948 he made his television debut in the Philco Television Playhouse. He then went on to star in one of the medium’s first crime series, Man against Crime, from 1949 to 1955.

In a career that spanned six decades on stage and screen, Bellamy played roles that fell into three broad categories: (1) the rich, reliable, but dull figure who is jilted by the leading lady; (2) the detective who always finds his prey; and (3) the slightly sinister but stylish villain. Usually appearing in supporting roles, Bellamy acted in more than 100 films. He starred in several “B” movies, notably four in which he portrayed the detective Ellery Queen. Bellamy often said he never regarded himself as a leading man, so no one else did either. He is best remembered on film and television as the “dull other man.” It was on the stage that Bellamy made his mark as a strong actor, in plays such as Tomorrow the World, State of the Union, and, most notably, Sunrise at Campobello. It was in the latter play that Bellamy built his reputation as an actor, by portraying Franklin Delano Roosevelt. By delving into the history of Roosevelt the man and the politician, Bellamy came to an understanding of the personality and psyche of the character. He then spent weeks at a rehabilitation center learning how to manage braces, crutches, and a wheelchair so that his portrayal of Roosevelt after he was stricken with polio would be realistic and accurate. Character acting was defined and perfected by Ralph Bellamy. He won the Tony and New York’s Critics Circle Award as best actor in Sunrise at Campobella and starred in the subsequent film version in 1960.

Bellamy appeared in several television series during the 1960s and 1970s, including The Eleventh Hour (1963–64), The Survivors (1969), The Mostly Deadly Game (1970), and Hunter (1976). He returned true to his roles as detective, villain, and other man in each of these series. It was in 1969 that Bellamy made a radical character shift by playing a diabolist in Rosemary’s Baby. More recently, he played a benevolent shipping magnate in the 1990 movie Pretty Woman and a millionaire in Trading Places (1983). He again played Roosevelt in the television miniseries The Winds of War (1983) and War and Remembrance (1988).

A champion of actors’ rights, Bellamy founded the Screen Actors Guild and served four terms as president of the American Actors’ Equity between 1952 and 1964. He doubled the equity’s assets within six years and established the first actors’ pension fund. Bellamy guided the Actors’ Equity through the political blacklisting of the McCarthy era by forming a panel that established ground rules to protect members against unproved charges of being members of or sympathizers with the Communist Party. He also actively lobbied for the repeal of theater admission taxes and for income averaging in computing taxes for performers.

“B” movie actor, the Ellery Queen of the 1940s, champion of actors’ rights, a well-known name in the film and television industries, a portrayer of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1950s and 1980s, Bellamy was most noted as an actor for his roles as the “nice but bland other man.” No one played love’s loser better than Bellamy. “I never got the girl,” he once recalled.