Born Leslie Howard Stainer in London to Hungarian immigrants and went to Dulwich School. After school, he worked as a bank clerk until the outbreak of WW I. He suffered from shell shock during action on the Western front and was encouraged to take up acting as therapy. He made his professional debut in London. But it was in the US, first on the stage, then in films, that he became established as a star. Blond, blue-eyed, and extremely charming, he represented the perfect Englishman to American audiences, a combination of romantic poet and incisive intellectual. During the 30s he co-starred with some of Hollywood's most glamorous leading ladies in a succession of popular films, occasionally also appearing in British pictures. Notable screen credits include OUTWARD BOUND (1930, his first talkie), A FREE SOUL (1931), SMILIN' THROUGH and THE ANIMAL KINGDOM (both 1932), SECRETS, CAPTURED! and BERKELEY SQUARE (all 1933), OF HUMAN BONDAGE, THE LADY IS WILLING, BRITISH AGENT and THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL (all 1934), THE PETRIFIED FOREST and ROMEO AND JULIET (both 1936), IT'S LOVE I'M AFTER and STAND-IN (both 1937), PYGMALION (1938, also director), INTERMEZZO (also producer) and GONE WITH THE WIND (both 1939), COMMON HERITAGE (1940), FORTY-NINTH PARALLEL and PIMPERNEL SMITH (also producer & director) (both 1941), IN WHICH WE SERVE (voice) and THE FIRST OF THE FEW (also producer & director) (both 1942) and WAR IN THE MEDITERRANEAN and THE GENTLE SEX (also producer & director) (both 1943, both narrator). At the outbreak of WW II he returned to England, where he began directing and producing films. He wrote articles and made radio broadcasts in addition to his acting. In 1943, while he was flying back to London from a secret mission to Lisbon, the British Overseas Airways plane he was on was shot down over the Bay of Biscay by Nazi raiders, who erroneously had suspected that Winston Churchill was among its passengers. Howard was killed. He was the father of actor Ronald Howard. A brother, Arthur Howard (1910-1995), played character roles in British films.  Nominated for Actor 1932-33: BERKELEY SQUARE  Nominated for Actor 1938: PYGMALION 2 nominations