Rex Reason(1928-2015)

In 1961, he was offered the role of Raymond Shaw in John Frankenheimer's The Manchurian Candidate (1962) by Frank Sinatra as a professional nod to him since they had done a screen test together for Fred Zinnemann's Tant qu'il y aura des hommes (1953) and Sinatra liked his work on the Warner Bros. TV series The Roaring 20's (1960). However, Reason had just quit the motion picture business to go into real estate, and could not be reached, so Sinatra cast Laurence Harvey instead.

My father's name was Rex Reason. I am a junior, and he and his new wife and family were over in Europe. They came across a theater marquee that listed my name, which of course was also his name. Not having kept in touch with what I had been doing, and to all of a sudden see "Rex Reason" on the marquee, well, it must have been an interesting moment.