Gifted with aristocratic good-looks and a rich speaking voice, English-born thespian Edmund Purdom graced dozens of European genre films in a career that spanned over 50 years.

Born in Hertfordshire in 1926, although his year of birth was misreported as 1924 for many years, Purdom made his professional stage debut at age 19 and worked with the Royal Shakespeare Theatre for two years. He arrived on Broadway in 1951, acting opposite Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh in productions of Shakespeare's "Antony and Cleopatra" and Shaw's "Caesar and Cleopatra." A supporting turn in Joseph L. Mankiewicz's Julius Caesar (1953) saw him cast in a string of lavish studio pictures as a lead, first as a last-minute replacement for Marlon Brando in The Egyptian (1954), then as the face to Mario Lanza's singing in The Student Prince (1954).

Although Purdom never achieved superstardom, he found no shortage of work in Italy for the rest of his life. He worked in nearly every major genre trend of the country's cinema, from sword-and-sandal epics, to stylish thrillers, to spaghetti Westerns to low-budget horror flics. He was also a prolific voice artist, dubbing Italian films into English. He made a brief foray behind-the-camera as one of names attached to the Brit slasher Dont Open Till Christmas (1984), but its troubled production meant his directing career was a one-off.

Purdom was married to and divorced from Linda Christian, Alicia Darr, and Tita Phillips. He died on New Years Day 2009 in Rome, aged 82. He was survived by his widow, Vivienne Purdom, and his two daughters from his first marriage.