Nicholas Benton Alexander III (1911-69) became a child actor in 1916. By the age of 15 he had appeared in forty-three pictures.
Alexander’s breakthrough as an adult came with All Quiet on the Western Front (1930), playing the tragic soldier Kemmerich. Unfortunately, none of his subsequent roles were as prestigious, and in the 1940s he largely turned to radio acting and announcing.
His return to high-profile screen acting occurred in 1952 after Jack Webb invited him to play Officer Frank Smith in Dragnet, first on radio and then transferring to television. Alexander played the part for seven years. After that, he acted occasionally, but had a sideline running car dealerships, which in turn sponsored his own local television series, The Ben Alexander Show.
Alexander’s sole Metro musical performance was as would-be womanizer Francis Nolan in Stage Mother.
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