August 23, 1926: Rudolph Valentino Dies

August 23, 1926: Rudolph Valentino dies of peritonitis, the result of appendicitis. There were no antibiotics in those days, so the biggest movie star of the moment was dead at the age of 31.

He was born on May 6, 1895, 3 months after Babe Ruth, in Castellaneta, at the top of the "heel" in "the boot of Italy," with the name Rodolfo Alfonso Raffaello Pierre Filiberto Guglielmi di Valentina d'Antonguella. This would be slightly anglicized to "Rudolph Valentino" when he came to America in 1913.

He got a job as a dancer in New York, and this led to acting. In 1917, a show with which he was touring reached Los Angeles, and he got his break in the still-new, still-silent Hollywood. He made a living in "bit parts" until 1921, when he was cast in The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, which made him a star; and The Sheik, which made him the 1st actor to be known as a "Latin Lover." (In his case, original Latin: Italian, not Spanish or Hispanic.)

He was typecast as a dashing, handsome man of action and adventure, and he enjoyed it. In 1926, he starred in Son of the Sheik, playing both his character from the earlier film and his son. It made him bigger than ever. It was released on July 9. Just 45 days later, he was dead, the 1st big Hollywood actor to die in his prime -- although a few actresses already had.

His death sent women all over the world into a frenzy. To put it into a comparatively current perspective, imagine that Leonardo DiCaprio had died of an unsuspected illness right after the release of The Departed (he was 31, almost 32 at the time). Pola Negri, the Polish actress who was then nearly as big a star as he was, made a scene at his funeral, throwing herself on his coffin. She later claimed they were lovers, which has never been confirmed. (He was married and divorced twice.)

He died over a year before the introduction of sound films. I've heard a recording of his voice, and while many silent film actors had an accent -- either foreign or New York -- that would have made their continuing to be taken seriously difficult, I don't think he would have had a problem.

Negri, who was 8 years older, lived until 1987. Had Valentino also lived that long, he would have been 82, which would hardly have been unreasonable. Had he just made it into the early 1930s, he could have played an Italian gangster battling James Cagney for turf. Had he made it into 1942, he could have played an exile in Casablanca. Had he made it into the mid-1950s, he could have been kissing Gina Lollobrigida and Sophia Loren onscreen, battling Cary Grant or Frank Sinatra for their affections.

Had he lived into 1963, he could have played the father of the character that Federico Fellini based on himself, played by Marcello Mastroianni, in 8½. And had he lived into 1974, he could have appeared in either of the 1st 2 Godfather films.

But we'll never know. Valentino fit the profile, however unintentionally, of too many others: "Live fast, die young, and leave a beautiful corpse." (The source of the quote is in dispute, but it dates at least as far back as Valentino's era.)

And as late as 1986, in "Manic Monday," a song that Prince wrote for The Bangles, the narrator sings, "Six o'clock already, I was just in the middle of a dream: I was kissing Valentino by a crystal blue Italian stream." Millions of people too young to have seen him as the Sheik will remember him because of that song.

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August 23, 1926 was a Monday. It was the off-season for the NFL and the NHL, and the NBA hadn't been founded yet. But there were Major League Baseball games played that day:

* The New York Yankees beat the Cleveland Indians, 3-2 at the then-new original Yankee Stadium. The team that was about to become known as "Murderers' Row" hit no home runs in support of pitcher Urban Shocker -- Babe Ruth went 0-for-3, Lou Gehrig 1-for-3 -- and got only 5 hits, but scored enough.

* The New York Giants lost to the Cincinnati Reds, 7-6 at Redland Field in Cincinnati. (It was renamed Crosley Field in 1934.) Wally Pipp, forced out of the Yankee lineup the year before by his slump and the rise of Gehrig, drove in the winning run with a 10th inning single.

* The Brooklyn Robins split a doubleheader with the Pittsburgh Pirates at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. The team, then named for manager Wilbert Robinson, and reverting to the "Dodgers" name in 1932 after he was fired, won the opener 7-3, and lost the nightcap 10-2.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Boston Red Sox, 9-1 at Fenway Park in Boston.

* The Philadelphia Athletics beat the Chicago White Sox, 4-1 at Shibe Park in Philadelphia.

* The St. Louis Browns beat the Washington Senators, 8-4 at Griffith Stadium in Washington. 

* The Boston Braves, the Chicago Cubs, the Philadelphia Phillies and the St. Louis Cardinals were not scheduled.