Actors - Gardner McKay

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	Actors - Gardner McKay

George Cadogan Gardner McKay (Manhattan, New York, USA, June 19 1932 – Hawaii Kai, Hawaii, USA, November 21, 2001) was a Hollywood heart-throb in the 1950s and 1960s, with rugged good looks and 6 foot 5 inch (1.96 m) 200 pound (91 kg) frame with an affinity for sailing that helped him land him a job with a TV series Adventures in Paradise based loosely on the writings of James Michener. His series character Adam Troy, was a Korean War vet who purchased or gambled for a twin-masted 82 foot (25 m) schooner Tiki, set afloat on the South Pacific, and Gardner played his restlessly romantic character with conviction as the dashing young actor and writer eventually abandoned Hollywood for his own adventures in the Amazon and Hawai`i. While he starred in the television series, he turned down the opportunity to star opposite Marilyn Monroe in Something's Got to Give, a film that was never produced. After traveling for years, McKay returned to the U.S. (Honolulu), and began a writing career. He was the great great grandson of Donald McKay, a builder of clipper ships in Boston and quite an accomplished sailor, with 8 Atlantic crossings by the age of 17. As well as being a writer, playwright, sculptor, photographer, drama critic, sea kayaker, and actor, he also rode camels across the Egyptian desert and slept with lions in the Hollywood Hills during different times in his remarkable life. With a natural desire to write since his Cornell days in New York, his first published notes were as a movie critic for the Cornell Daily Sun. One of his art works was left at the Modern Art Museum of New York and another at the White Museum of Ithaca: a mobile of over 18 feet (5.5 m) wide and 14 feet (4.3 m) high built from 56 metallic pieces.

In 1956 he was on board the French liner SS Ile de France when she turned back to rescue many passengers on the Italian SS Andrea Doria, which sank after her tragic collision with SS Stockholm (51 victims). The pictures he took from the rescue were published in The New York Times, Life and spread over the whole world.

Gardner was languidly reading a book of poetry in a Hollywood coffee shop when he was spotted by Dominick Dunne, a 20th Century Fox TV executive producer, who was searching for an actor for the starring role of his future series Adventures in Paradise. Dunne left his Fox business card on his table and said "If you're interested in discussing a television series, call me." And McKay did. He passed screen tests with 9 other candidates. He was far from being the best for the part, but he had great assets for the producers: his presence made the attraction of all (and especially the women!), and he knew perfectly how to tie knots! Although unknown to the public, McKay had his picture on Life Magazine's July 6 1959 cover, two months before the TV series went on the air. This publicity, repeated by many other magazines throughout the country, launched the show and McKay's fame.

In 1983, still a bachelor (in spite of the many fiancees the newspapers had attributed to him), he married Madeleine Madigan, an Irish cook and caterer by profession and a painter by passion, whom he had first met in Rome three years earlier. She had a daughter, Liza, from a previous marriage. They travelled throughout the world and leased their Beverly Hills home. They lived a year in London, and back in Los Angeles for a few years, before settling in their final home in 1987 in Hawaii Kai, Hawaii, about 5 miles (8 km) from Honolulu, on a hill with a magnificent view overlooking the mountains and the Pacific Ocean. There, he penned the play Sea Marks and the novel Toyer. From 1995 to 2000, McKay had his own weekly radio show every Sunday on Hawaïi Radio called Stories on the Wind. where he used to read short stories for the listeners.

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