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Peter Arne

Peter Arne

Birthday: 1920-09-29 | Place of Birth: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Born in Kuala Lumpur, British Malaya, to a Swiss-French mother and an American father, Peter Arne was an actor and an antique dealer who was murdered in 1983. In the late 1940s, Arne and his partner Jack Corke befriended acclaimed novelist Mary Renault and her partner, Julie Mullard, on the SS Cairo, a steamer bound from Britain to South Africa and convinced them to go into business building homes for immigrants to the country. Renault financed using her £25,000 MGM award, employing labourers and craftsmen to begin construction of several houses, but Arne and Corke squandered the money, racking up debts before stealing Renault's car and returning to the UK to avoid charges of embezzlement. On 1st August 1983, Arne attended a costume fitting for a role in Doctor Who. On his return home, neighbours reported sounds of an argument to the police who subsequently found Arne's body inside his Knightsbridge flat. He had been bludgeoned to death with a stool and log from his fireplace. The prime suspect in Arne's murder was Giuseppe Perusi, a schoolteacher from Italy who had been living rough in a local park, and for whom Arne had been providing food. Four days later, a body matching Perusi's description was found in the River Thames at Wandsworth, having drowned in an apparent suicide. At the subsequent inquest in October 1983, Police concluded that Perusi had beaten the actor to death then killed himself.

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Known For

Acting

Year
Title

Role

1982
Victor/Victoria

as    Labisse

1975
The Return of the Pink Panther

as    Colonel Sharki

1971
Murders in the Rue Morgue

as    Aubert

1969
The Oblong Box

as    Samuel Trench

1968
Battle Beneath the Earth

as    Arnold Kramer

1964
The Black Torment

as    Seymour

1963
Girl in the Headlines

as    Hammond Barker

1962
The Pirates of Blood River

as    Bosu'n Hench

1961
The Treasure of Monte Cristo

as    Boldini

1961
The Hellfire Club

as    Thomas

1960
Danger Within

as    Capitano Benucci

1960
Conspiracy of Hearts

as    Lt. Schmidt

1960
Scent of Mystery

as    Robert Fleming

1958
Intent to Kill

as    Kral

1958
The Moonraker

as    Major Gregg/Edmund Tyler

1957
Tarzan and the Lost Safari

as    Dick Penrod

1957
High Tide at Noon

as    Owen MacKenzie

1956
Timeslip

as    Dr. Stephen Rayner / Jarvis

1955
The Cockleshell Heroes

as    Marine Stevens

1944
For Those in Peril

as    Junior Officer