When most people think of actor Robert Young they recall his popular TV medical series “Marcus Welby, M.D.” (1969-1976) where he was the epitome of the kind, compassionate doctor or they remember Jim Anderson, the perfect dad in the all-American sitcom “Father Knows Best” (1954-1960).  And he was also typecast as Mr. Nice Guy in most of his Hollywood films, playing bland romantic leads or the leading man’s best friend or some other decent, noble or well-intentioned character who blended into the woodwork and rarely stood out. But there were at least two occasions when Young trashed his good guy image by playing despicable characters and for some reason these are the two performances I remember best – Fritz Marberg, a budding Nazi party member in THE MORTAL STORM (1940), and Larry Ballentine, a complete cad and accused murderer in THEY WON’T BELIEVE ME (1947), an often preposterous but highly entertaining film noir that deserves a release on DVD. 

THE MORTAL STORM, directed by the great Frank Borzage, is a cautionary tale about the xenophobia that swept through Germany in the thirties and triggered the rise of the Nazi party. Though it is structured as a romantic drama set in a small German village, the film’s turbulent background eventually occupies the foreground and overwhelms the story. At the beginning of the film Young is the fiancé of Freya Roth, played by Margaret Sullavan, but as he becomes swept up in the ideology of the Nazi party, he slowly becomes a threat to the Roth family and all non-Aryan members of the community. (I don’t recall if the term Nazi is ever actually used in the film since Hollywood – and in this case MGM – was still marketing and distributing its films in Germany). Young’s transformation from the ardent suitor to a hateful oppressor may be melodramatic but it’s a side of Young you always knew was there. Nobody can be that nice all the time and in this film his conversion to fascism allows him to finally release all that pent-up anger for being stuck in drab romantic roles all those years at MGM. He’s a frightening character and you genuinely fear for Sullavan and James Stewart when they flee the town at the tragic conclusion.

Young is even better in THEY WON’T BELIEVE ME which has a terrific supporting cast (Jane Greer, Susan Hayward, Rita Johnson) and is produced by Joan Harrison (a screenwriter for Hitchcock on four features and his TV series “Alfred Hitchcock Presents.”) He plays a married stockbroker but is a compulsive womanizer and liar. And capable of embezzlement and other illegal business transactions. Told in flashback from a courtroom murder case,  Young’s character emerges as a weak, amoral and highly ambitious guy who attracts women who sense a similar hunger and drive for success. His wealthy wife is aware of his many flaws but clings to him anyway and tries to manipulate his behavior through her purse strings. It doesn’t work of course and he plunges into one adulterous affair after another leading to a chain of tragic coincidences that land him in a courtroom, facing the death sentence. Bad luck comes in spades in this film and Young, like Tom Neal’s character in DETOUR, seems doomed from the start. The ending is over the top but somehow appropriate considering everything that has gone before. And Young is completely convincing as the spineless, callow and self-absorbed Larry Ballentine. He’s such a loser that you feel real empathy for him by the end of his miserable tale. It’s a long way from Marcus Welby and Jim Anderson but somehow you always knew something dark and disturbing was behind Young’s kindly smile.