Tony Russel

One of several handsome American actors who migrated to Europe in the early 60s when their careers in the States weren't progressing as well as they wanted, Antonio Pietro Russo, aka Tony Russel (or Tony Russell), was born on November 23, 1925 in Wisconsin, the son of Italian immigrants. Brought up with a strong religious foundation, he developed an interest in acting at a relatively young age and, following his honorable discharge with the Air Force, took up languages, speech and drama at the University of Michigan. After training at the Pasadena Playhouse, Tony began to find uncredited ethnic roles in such 1950's films as Hiawatha (1952), The Silver Chalice (1954), Jump Into Hell (1955), Anything Goes (1956), King Creole (1958), Don't Give Up the Ship (1959) and Last Train from Gun Hill (1959). He also found work in a few popular shows including "The Lone Wolf," "Highway Patrol," "Broken Arrow," "Peter Gunn" and "Zorro." His first prime movie role came with the low-budget Korean War yarn War Is Hell (1961), courtesy of writer, producer, director Burt Topper. Russel's big break came when he was given the starring role of notorious bandit Fra Diavolo in the Italian-made action adventure The Last Charge (1962) co-starring Israeli actress Haya Harareet. Finding a market for himself in Italy as a dashing hero, he packed up his gear and headed for Europe in September of 1961 with wife, actress Jodean Lawrence and young son in tow to go where the action was. Settling in Rome, for the next several years, Tony worked steadily in standard adventures, swashbucklers, "007"-type spy tales and sci-fi thrillers. Most of his work followed the typical title-tells-all fare starring in such actioneers as Knights of Terror (1963), The Secret Seven (1963), Sword of Damascus (1964), L'ultima carica (1964), The Revolt of the Seven (1964) (aka The Spartan Gladiator), Secret of the Sphinx (1964), Oath of Zorro (1965) (title role), The Wild, Wild Planet (1966) and its companion film The War of the Planets (1966), Target Goldseven (1966) and Honeymoons Will Kill You (1966). Tony was one of the unfortunates to turn down the popular "spaghetti western" A Fistful of Dollars (1964) which made an international superstar out of Clint Eastwood. He also auditioned to play Disney's TV "Zorro" character but lost out to Guy Williams. Fluent in Italian (from high school), Tony found work dubbing voices and was the founder and president of the English Language Dubbers Association (ELDA) in Italy. Tony returned to Hollywood in 1967 but found scant work on film and TV, often veering off onto the dinner theater circuit. Some TV guest shots came his way with "Death Valley Days," "The High Chaparral," "Night Gallery," "Hec Ramsey," "Lou Grant," "CHiPS" and "Vega$." His old friend Burt Topper hired him and gave him third billing in both the cheaply-budgeted biker drama The Hard Ride (1971) starring Robert Fuller, and as a tent-show evangelist preacher who takes in singing hustler Fabian in the hip drama Soul Hustler (1973). Save for an isolated 1992 appearance in the series "Hearts Afire," Tony ended his career following featured roles in the TV movies The Mystic Warrior (1984) and The Vegas Strip War (1984). Little was heard of him after this. He died on March 18, 2017, in Las Vegas, Nevada, at aged 91. He was buried in Boulder City. His longtime second wife, Renee Iris Russo (1942-2019), followed him in death more than two years later.