Naugatuck Daily News, Naugatuck, CT, July 24, 1948:
“Michael Towne who recently returned from Hollywood where he played in several motion pictures for Columbia Studios will appear in a role in the play “Pappa is All” at the Southbury Playhouse it was announced today by Jack Quinn, PR man for the theater. The play will open at the theater next Monday night. Mr. Towne is assigned to the role at the last minute, Mr. Quinn said, and is rehearsing with the cast this week. The play is a comedy by Patterson Green.”
Towne, the notice added, had gone to Hollywood in the early 1940s and had returned there after being discharged from the army. At one point in 1947, he was mentioned to play silent screen heart throb Rudolph Valentino under the direction of the veteran Archie Mayo. That project, however, was not realized until 1951 and with Anthony Dexter in the title-role directed by Lewis Collins. Hollywood offers apparently drying up, Towne arrived for this, his first summer play, with wife and child in tow, and expected to stay for the summer with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Klevman.“This fall,” the notice concluded, “Mr. Towne will do theater work in New York City, he reports.”
Handsome Drew Miller was one of the ex-GIs hired for the RKO drama “The Dream of Home,” which was finally released later in 1946 as Till the End of Time. According to RKO publicity, the studio bosses liked what they saw and wanted to hire the former air force master sergeant but he was nowhere to be found. After a bit of detective work the youngster was finally located pressing records at the Decca plant and,
“[n]ow he is being groomed for lead roles,” gossip columnist Bob Thomas promised. Alas, lead roles were not to be as Drew would turn up only in unbilled bits.
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