He is most known for his leading role in the independent film Prehistoric Women.[2]
He appeared in the Carleton Holmes play Free for All in Los Angeles in 1947,[3] with a review stating that he had played his role with "effective sincerity."[4] He appeared in the play Kitty Doone by Aben Kandel in 1949.[5] He was also on stage in Miranda, You Only Twinkle Once, Rain, School for Scandal, Three Out of Four, and Anna Lucasta; the latter was a touring production in which Ann Dvorak costarred.[2]
Shortly after being signed by Columbia and performing in the successful Hugo Haas film Pickup, Nixon began refusing the small roles in B pictures offered to him. He was blacklisted by Harry Cohn and months later asked to be released from his contract. He claimed that all of the studios banded together to keep him from working. Nixon, by then divorced from Wilson, worked in construction for several years.[2]
Producer Ron Ormond cast him in such films as Outlaw Women and Mesa of Lost Women and as the lead in Gulliver and the Little People, a modern take on Gulliver's Travels, but the series was not picked up.[6] Nixon appeared on various television shows in the 1950s and early 1960s, including Gunsmoke.[2]
Nixon was an informant for Confidential Magazine;[7][8] this became public knowledge during the Confidential trial in 1957.[2]
Nixon became a writer in the early 1960s, publishing novels with such titles as The Sex Symbol and The Bitch Goddess. He wrote under his own name and the pseudonyms Nick Allen as well as several Shaft novels under the pen name Don Romano,[9] finding more success as a writer than as an actor. He later reflected on his career as an actor, "Things went wrong, just put it that way. I'm not bitter. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the people I met and the fun I had."[2]
Personal life and death
Nixon met actress Marie Wilson while they were filming Rookies on Parade. Wilson was still engaged to director Nick Grinde when she and Nixon eloped in 1942. After two separations and reconciliations, they divorced in 1950 following years of stress due to Nixon's underemployment, and public embarrassments due to Nixon's tendency to get into violent altercations and drive under the influence of alcohol.[2][10]
Nixon married three more times. His second marriage, to Alma Hammond, was annulled shortly after it took place in 1954.[2] He and his third wife, Velda May Paulsen, got into a violent altercation that made headlines in early 1958. Paulsen went to visit an old boyfriend, Burt Lancaster, in the hospital. Nixon, displeased that his wife went to see Lancaster, reportedly struck Paulsen, and Paulsen attacked him with kitchen knives Nixon had given her for Christmas. The fight resulted in Paulsen being arrested for attempted murder, but Nixon refused to press charges and the two reconciled.[11] She died of burns suffered in an explosion later that year.[2][12] Nixon's fourth wife was Maria Magda.[2]
^ abcdefghijklmnWagner, Laura (Winter 2014–2015). "Allan Nixon: Off the Deep End". Films of the Golden Age. 79: 78–80.
^"Legitimate: Plays Out of Town - Free for All". Variety. Vol. 168, no. 3. 1947-09-24. p. 52 – via Proquest Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive.
^Fischler, Alan (1947-10-04). "Legitimate: OUT-OF-TOWN OPENINGS - FREE FOR ALL". The Billboard. Vol. 59, no. 39. p. 32 – via Proquest Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive.
^"Legitimate: Kitty Doone". Variety. Vol. 64, no. 1. 1949-12-14. p. 60 – via Proquest Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive.
^"Film Report"(PDF). Broadcasting Telecasting. 1952-08-18. p. 90. Retrieved 2019-01-08.
