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David Hedison

American actor (1927-2019)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMar 11, 2026
Entity authorityQ72262 ↗
Source-derived summary

Albert David Hedison Jr. (May 20, 1927 – July 18, 2019) was an American film, television, and stage actor. He was known for his roles as the title character in The Fly (1958), Captain Lee Crane in the television science fiction drama Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1964–1968), and CIA agent Felix Leiter in two James Bond films, Live and Let Die (1973) and Licence to Kill (1989).

Biography

Early life and career

Albert David Hedison, Jr was born in Providence, Rhode Island, to Armenian immigrants Albert David Hedison (Heditsian) Sr (Armenian: Ալպէռ Դաւիթ Հետիցեան) and Rose Boghosian (Armenian: Ռօզ Պօղոսեան). Hedison decided he wanted to be an actor after he saw Tyrone Power in the film Blood and Sand. Hedison enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1945 during World War II, but the war ended before he completed basic training. He served 18 months before his discharge.

He began his acting career with the Sock and Buskin Players at Brown University before moving to New York to study with Sanford Meisner and Martha Graham at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre and with Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio. Early in his career, he had gotten a nose job.

He was billed as Al Hedison in his early film work until 1959 when he was cast in the role of Victor Sebastian in the short-lived espionage television series Five Fingers.

Editorial summary

“David Hedison” enters the record as american actor (1927-2019). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what David, Hedison and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA useful biographical orientation record, particularly for establishing names, roles and a first chronology. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1927, 2019, 1958, 1964—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1927-05-20. Its strongest next move is a source search built around David, Hedison and American.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“David Hedison” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, David, Hedison and American provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q72262. VIAF identifies the subject as 61756703. The Library of Congress control number is no2001016899. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1927, 2019, 1958 and 1964.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “David Hedison”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow David Hedison primary sources, David Hedison archive and David research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “David Hedison”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “David Hedison” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.