- In January 1985, while dying of lung cancer, he insisted on filming a television commercial, advising everyone, "Now that I'm gone, I tell you don't smoke . . . " The commercial had a profound effect on viewing audiences, since it was released after his death. His decision to share what killed him gained him a whole new generation of fans who respected and admired him for this unforgettable gesture.
- He was an accomplished photographer. He took many photos on the sets of the various projects he worked on over the years.
- When he found out he would be playing Pharaoh Rameses II opposite Charlton Heston's Moses in The Ten Commandments (1956) and that he would be shirtless for most of the film, he began a rigorous weightlifting program because he did not want to be physically overshadowed by Heston (which explains his buffer than normal physique during The King and I (1956), another film he was set to work on at the time).
- He badly wanted to play the title role in Spartacus (1960) and the role of Rasputin in Nicholas and Alexandra (1971).
- Married Doris Kleiner on the set during shooting of The Magnificent Seven (1960).
- Jack Kirby used his physical likeness (noticeably his bald head and intense stare) as the visual inspiration for the original illustrations of Prof. Charles Xavier in the ''X-Men'' comics (created in 1963). He was 43 years old at that point.
- Was acting in an adaptation of William Shakespeare's 'Twelfth Night' (his Broadway debut), when Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japanese. That night's show was canceled and most of the crew enlisted soon after. The show lasted only 15 performances and Brynner was out of a job until 1943.
- He spoke 11 languages.
- Is one of only ten actors to have won both a Tony and an Oscar for having portrayed the same role on stage and screen, he the third such for his role in The King and I (1956). The others are Joel Grey (Cabaret (1972)), Shirley Booth (Come Back, Little Sheba (1952)), Rex Harrison (My Fair Lady (1964)), Anne Bancroft (The Miracle Worker (1962)), Paul Scofield (A Man for All Seasons (1966)), José Ferrer (Cyrano de Bergerac (1950)), Jack Albertson (The Subject Was Roses (1968)), Viola Davis (Fences (2016)), and Lila Kedrova (Zorba the Greek (1964)). Kedrova is the only one to have won the Oscar before the Tony.
- He died on the same day as his The Battle of Neretva (1969) co-star Orson Welles: October 10, 1985.
- He fought very hard in the late fifties for the refugees of all over the world with the help of the United Nations.
- Awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6162 Hollywood Blvd. on February 8, 1960.
- Audrey Hepburn is the godmother of his daughter Victoria.
- Always prepared breakfast while wearing a silk kimono.
- Had one daughter with his second wife, Doris Kleiner: Victoria Brynner (born November 1962 in Switzerland).
- Won Broadway's 1952 Tony Award as Best Supporting or Featured Actor (Musical) for "The King and I", a role he recreated in his Oscar-winning performance in the film of the same name, The King and I (1956). He also won a second, Special Tony Award in 1985 "honoring his 4,525 performances in 'The King and I'".
- Had two daughters with his third wife, Jacqueline de Croisset: Mia Brynner (adopted 1974, born in Vietnam) and Melody Brynner (adopted 1974, born in Vietnam).
- Three of his films were remade in the late 1990s, in rapid succession, as animated films: The King and I (1956) and Anastasia (1956) were remade as animated films of the same name The King and I (1999), Anastasia (1997)) and The Ten Commandments (1956) was remade as The Prince of Egypt (1998).
- Had played the role of King Mongkut of Siam on stage, in the movies, and on a short-lived television series.
- As a young circus acrobat, he fell from a trapeze at the age of 16 years old and nearly died. He remained unable to move at all for eight months but eventually made a total recovery.
- After seeing him in the play "Lute Song" with Mary Martin in 1949, Judy Garland wanted to do a film version of it, so she asked him to do a screen test with her. Nothing came of it, but it led to his screen debut that year in Port of New York (1949).
- When he got the offer to star in "The King and I" on Broadway, he had established himself at CBS directing Danger (1950), Omnibus (1952) and Studio One (1948) as well as training new directors in the fledgling medium. He took a leave of absence to play the King and even after his success jokingly referred to acting as his part-time job.
- Began his acting career in France, and spoke fluent French.
- In Taras Bulba (1962), he wanted the film to capture the essence of Nikolay Gogol's novel. By the time it reached the screen, it was dismissed as just another routine action picture in Cossack clothing, the very thing he had hoped to avoid. According to his son Rock Brynner, his father's disappointment was so great that he never again invested much, if any, of himself in his remaining screen work.
- He was the only actor to appear in both The Magnificent Seven (1960) and its first sequel, Return of the Seven (1966). However, he did not appear in either of the other sequels, Guns of the Magnificent Seven (1969) and The Magnificent Seven Ride! (1972).
- Had one son with his first wife, Virginia Gilmore: Yul "Rock" Brynner II (Rock Brynner) born December 23, 1946.
- Played 'The King' in 'The King and I' 4,633 times.
- According to his son, Yul "Rock" Brynner, "In his youth, Yul Brynner was Jean Cocteau's opium supplier." Empire and Odyssey, p. 141.
- Godfather of Charlotte Gainsbourg.
- Daughter Victoria Brynner is a successful businesswoman who founded her own company Stardust Visions and Stardust Celebrities in Los Angeles (1992).
- Confessed in an interview that when he spoke about movies with his French wife, they talked in English, but when it was about art, then they spoke in French.
- Was the visual inspiration for the original illustrations of superhero Green Lantern/Abin Sur (created in 1959). He was 39 years old at the time. Sur is well-known as the predecessor of Green Lantern/Hal Jordan, who replaced him after his death when Sur crashed with his ship on planet Earth.
- While touring in the play "Odyssey" in the mid-1970s, he attained a reputation for being a holy terror toward hotel staff members. Among other things, all hotel suites where he would stay had to be painted a certain shade of tan and all kitchens in those hotel suites had to be stocked in advance with "one dozen brown eggs, under no circumstances white ones!" (this should be noted, in fairness, that Brynner personally paid the expense of these requests). The play itself, later retitled "Home, Sweet Homer", had a successful pre-Broadway tour of over a year, but lasted exactly one performance when it opened on Broadway in 1976.
- In 1950, before he achieved fame, he was the director of a children's puppet show on CBS, Life with Snarky Parker (1950), which lasted barely eight months on the air before cancellation.
- Daughter Lark Brynner (born 1958) was born out of wedlock. She was raised by her mother, German actress Frances Martin.
- Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II's initial choice for their Broadway "King and I" musical's featured role King of Siam was Rex Harrison, a role that he had played in Anna and the King of Siam (1946), but Harrison was unavailable due to film work. Mary Martin (I) suggested Brynner to them for the role since he had appeared on Broadway with her in the stage-musical "Lute Song", and they took her up on her suggestion. Brynner. In rehearsals, at his first meeting with costume designer Irene Sharaff, he had only a fringe of curly hair. He asked Sharaff what he was to do about it. When she told him to shave it, he was horrified and refused, convinced he would look terrible. During out-of-town tryouts in New Haven, CT (February 27, 1951), Sharaff told Rodgers and Hammerstein and director John Van Druten, "Brynner should be bald!" Ordered to shave his head, he gave in, shaving off his long curly black hair and putting dark stage make-up on his shaved head. The effect was so well received that it became his trademark. He came to dominate his role and the musical, starring in a four-year national tour culminating in his last performance, a special Sunday-night show, on June 30, 1985, in honor of Brynner and his 4,625th performance of the role. He died less than four months later, on October 10, 1985.
- Despite numerous resources stating that he was interred at the non-existent "Saint Robert Churchyard at the Monastery of Saint Michael", he actually was buried in the Orthodox cemetery Saint-Michel-du-Bois-Aubry of Luzé, a village 55km from Tours in Touraine, France.
- A recording of him explaining how being bald helped him is included in a song by Stephen Malkmus (of Pavement) titled "Jo Jo's Jacket". The first verses are about Brynner and include a reference to Westworld (1973) and The King and I (1956).
- When he formed his own company, Alciona, to produce films in which he would both star and direct, he commissioned Jean Cocteau to design the logo for the company stationery.
- Left the bulk of his estate to his fourth wife, Kathy Brynner. He left her their New York co-op apartment at United Nations Plaza, which she sold three years later for approximately $1.75 million. He also left a life-estate interest in his French chateau.
- His paternal grandfather, Julius Bryner, was of Swiss-German origin (Julius was the son of Johannes Bruner and Marie Huber Von Windisch). His paternal grandmother, Natalya Iosifovna Kurkutova, was Russian, from Irkutsk, and was said to be of part Mongolian/Buryat ancestry. His maternal grandparents, Dmitriy Evgrafovich Blagovidov and Anna Timofeevna Kireeva, were also Russian, from Penza.
- Apprentice of Michael Chekhov.
- Mentioned in the popular mid-1980s song "One Night in Bangkok", sung by Murray Head, from the soundtrack of the musical "Chess".
- He was a great believer in rituals.
- Had appeared in three different films with Eli Wallach: The Magnificent Seven (1960), The Poppy Is Also a Flower (1966) and Romance of a Horsethief (1971).
- One of 13 actors who have received an Academy Award nomination for his portrayal of a real-life king. The others in chronological order are Charles Laughton for The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933), Robert Morley for Marie Antoinette (1938), Basil Rathbone for If I Were King (1938), Laurence Olivier for Henry V (1944) and Richard III (1955), José Ferrer for Joan of Arc (1948), John Gielgud for Becket (1964), Peter O'Toole for Becket (1964) and The Lion in Winter (1968), Robert Shaw for A Man for All Seasons (1966), Richard Burton for Anne of the Thousand Days (1969), Kenneth Branagh for Henry V (1989), Nigel Hawthorne for The Madness of King George (1994), and Colin Firth for The King's Speech (2010).
- Actively sought the role of Grigori Rasputin in Nicholas and Alexandra (1971). However, Tom Baker was cast.
- Is a recipient of the presitigious Connor Award, given by the brothers of the Phi Alpha Tau fraternity based out of Emerson College in Boston.
- Biography in: "The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives". Volume One, 1981-1985, pages 111-114. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1998.
- He met his fourth wife Kathy Brynner née Lee, an oriental dancer when they were in the London run of musical of The King and I.
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