Tom Neal is best remembered for his off-screen exploits, which involved scandal, mayhem and a charge of murder. Before his 1938 screen debut in MGM's Out West with the Hardys (1938), Neal had been a member of the boxing team at Northwestern University, had debut ed on the Broadway stage in 1935 and had received a law degree from Harvard, also in 1938. Throughout the 1940s and into the 1950s, he appeared mostly as tough guys in Hollywood low-budgeters. In 1951, in a dispute over the on-again / off-again affections and the wavering allegiance of notorious actress / "party girl" Barbara Payton , he mixed it up with Payton's paramour, the aristocratic actor Franchot Tone . The former college boxer Neal inflicted upon Tone a smashed cheekbone, a broken nose and a brain concussion. Hollywood essentially blackballed Neal thereafter, but he would come to find a livelihood in gardening and landscaping. He was brought to trial in 1965 for the murder of his wife Gale, who had been shot to death with a .45-caliber bullet to the back of her head. Prosecutors sought the death penalty for Neal, which at the time meant a trip to the cyanide-gas chamber. The trial jury, however, convicted him only of "involuntary manslaughter", for which he was sentenced to 10 years in jail. On 7 December 1971 he was released on parole, having served exactly six years to the day. Eight months later, Tom Neal was dead of heart failure.
Father of actor Tom Neal Jr. (b.1957)Neal was born to a wealthy family in Evanston, Illinois.Neal's family wanted him to become a lawyer, but the muscular Neal, a standout boxer on his college's boxing team, dreamed of an acting career.Noted for his rugged good looking and charming personality, as well as his hair trigger temper, and jealous outbursts.Tried a comeback in the movies and on television in the late 1950s, but his career was finished due to his violent off-screen reputation.Neal had an impressive college boxing career. While at Northwestern and Harvard Universities, Neal compiled an amateur boxing record of 44-3 (41 knockouts).Was once engaged in 1934 to Inez Martin, a one-time Follies girl and ex-mistress of murdered racketeer Arnold Rothstein, who was shot to death inside a Park Central Hotel room on November 4, 1928. Martin was twice Tom's age. His father put an end to the whole thing by threatening Tom with disinheritance of the family's million-dollar fortune.Made his Broadway stage debut in a small role in "If This Be Treason" in 1935. Moved to California when a couple of other Broadway roles in "Spring Dance" (1936) and "Daughters of Atreus" (1936) failed to advance his career.Both he and battling girlfriend Barbara Payton appeared together in The Great Jesse James Raid (1953).After his film career dissipated after a flurry of bad press, he left Hollywood for Palm Springs and worked such jobs as a night manager for a restaurant and a gardener. Eventually he set up his own landscaping business, but the business failed after a few years and he went into bankruptcy.His second wife Patricia Fenton, whom he married in 1956, died of cancer in 1958. She bore his namesake, Tom Neal Jr. , who later had a role in the remake of his father's classic film noir: Detour (1992). Following her death, his son lived with Tom's sister.
The MGM Crime Reporter introduces James Hollister, the Police Chief of a metropolitan city. He mentions that what may seem like the smallest of crimes or no crime at all may have the biggest negative impact of society, the illegal distribution of slot machines being one such example. Changing the names to protect the innocent, he tells the story of mob boss Rocky Fallon who earned much income for his illegal activities from earnings from slot machines, where the insertion of a nickel here and a nickel there added up to several thousand dollars profit per day. It was such an important component of his business that he inserted a mole into the mayor's office, the mayor who vowed as part of his election to get tough on crime. People who were not even remotely associated with the slot machines, such as dry cleaning business owner Frank Watson, whose life was irrevocable changed for the worse by Rocky, who again could not have done what he did without that slot machine revenue.