Short and intense Sal Mineo was a sad-eyed juvenile and adult actor with black curls. At age eight his misbehavior caused him to be kicked out of a parochial school; he went on to attend dancing classes and two years later was cast in Broadway's The Rose Tattoo, moving from there to a prominent adolescent role in The King and I with Yul Brynner. Mineo debuted onscreen in 1955 and for the next decade he was a busy screen actor, first in juvenile roles and then in youthful leads; his characters were often troubled. For his work at age 16 in Rebel Without a Cause (1955), his third feature, he received a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination; he was nominated in the same category for Exodus (1960). His film work began to dry up after the mid-'60s and Mineo turned to TV and the stage. He directed the play Fortune and Men's Eyes on the West Coast and on Broadway. He was stabbed to death on the street in 1976.
Sal Mineo
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- Made Broadway debut at age 11, speaking one line in Tennessee Williams' The Rose Tattoo.
- Big break came playing the Crown Prince of Siam in The King and I on-stage with Gertrude Lawrence and Yul Brynner.
- Won acclaim as Plato, a gay teen infatuated with James Dean's character Jim in the 1955 drama Rebel Without a Cause.
- As a teen idol, took up singing in 1957 with hit songs like "Start Movin' (In My Direction)" and "Lasting Love."
- After a career slump, took roles on television and went back to theater directing the prison drama Fortune and Men's Eyes and attempting a comeback playing the bisexual burglar in P.S. Your Cat Is Dead.
- Murdered by a single stab wound to the heart at age 37.
- Mentioned in the song "Look at Me, I'm Sandra Dee" in Grease. Mineo died the year before the film version was released, and the lyrics were altered to reference Elvis Presley instead.