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''Jim was one of the first people who called,'' Mr. Cagney to pretend to whimper as he was led to the electric chair, to demonstrate to boys - parts played by the Dead End Kids - that their criminal idol was not so tough after all, that crime did not pay.
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O'Brien persuaded the hoodlum played by Mr. O'Brien played Father O'Hara in ''The Fireball'' and Father Connolly in ''Angels With Dirty Faces.''
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In addition to playing priests in ''The Fighting 69th'' and ''Fighting Father Dunne,'' Mr. Cagney, ''Air Mail,'' ''Submarine D-1,'' ''Submarine Zone (Escape to Glory),'' ''Flight Lieutenant,'' ''The Navy Comes Through,'' ''Marine Raiders,'' ''Secret Command'' and ''Okinawa.'' He also played a host of soldiers, marines, sailors and pilots in, among other films, ''Here Comes the Navy'' (1934), in which he teamed up for the first time with Mr.
PAT O BRIEN AND THE PRIESTS OF LOVE MOVIE
O'Brien established a movie archetype for male journalists as cynical, hard-boiled, hard- drinking, gruff but often idealistic men who wore their hats in the office. In ''The Front Page,'' ''The Final Edition,'' ''Scandal for Sale,'' ''Off the Record'' and briefly on the stage in ''Miss Lonelyhearts,'' an adaptation of the Nathanael West novel that was also a newspaper story, Mr.
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When the Catholic Actors Guild, of which he was an honorary vice president, named him their man of the year in 1973, the tribute said, ''He is the only actor in motion pictures to portray five great Americans,'' and listed Rockne, Father Duffy, Father Dunne in ''Fighting Father Dunne,'' Mr. ''The public is unaware,'' he once said, ''how rarely an actor, in his entire career, gets a great role.I've been lucky, I've had many juicy parts and three great ones,'' he said, referring to his roles as Hildy Johnson, Father Duffy and Knute Rockne. O'Brien thought it was one of his best roles. He had parts in short films, then moved into feature films in 1929 with ''Fury of the Wild'' and ''The Freckled Rascal.'' His portrayal of a newspaper reporter in the screen adaptation of Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur's play ''The Front Page'' in 1930 helped etch the image of the enterprising, cynical journalist onto the imaginations of moviegoers. O'Brien came to the movies in the late 1920's. In 1978, he and Myrna Loy played Burt Reynolds's parents in ''The End.'' In ''Ragtime,'' he appeared with James Cagney, his friend of several decades, and with Mrs. He performed on the dinner-theater circuit in comedies such as ''The Second Time Around'' in 1978, and, in 1983, when he was 84 years old, in ''On Golden Pond,'' with his wife, Eloise. Despite intermittent illness in recent years, he went on acting. He was the nice guy who almost always finished first. He was tough, but he had feelings, and he was not afraid to show them. He was no matinee idol, but he was lovable, charming and loyal. He was no glamour boy, but he was good-looking. In most of his movies he was the American male that American males were supposed to be. He was Hildy Johnson, the aggressive reporter in ''The Front Page,'' Father Duffy in ''The Fighting 69th'' and Knute Rockne in the title role in ''Knute Rockne - All American.''