in the same writer's I've Got Sixpence. Film actor O'Brien's theatre work attracted the attention of Pandro Berman at RKO, who offered him a role as the romantic lead in The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939). He returned to Broadway to play Mercutio opposite Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh in Romeo and Juliet. RKO offered O'Brien a long-term contract. His roles included A Girl, a Guy, and a Gob (1941) and Parachute Battalion (1941). The latter starred Nancy Kelly whom O'Brien would later marry, although the union lasted less than a year. O'Brien made Obliging Young Lady with Eve Arden, and Powder Town. In May 1942, Universal bought out his contract with RKO so he could appear opposite Deanna Durbin in The Amazing Mrs. Holliday (1943). After this he joined the armed services. World War II During World War II, O'Brien served in the U.S. Army Air Forces and appeared in the Air Forces' Broadway play Winged Victory by Moss Hart. He appeared alongside Red Buttons, Karl Malden, Kevin McCarthy, Gary Merrill, Barry Nelson, and Martin Ritt. When the play was filmed in 1944, O'Brien reprised his stage performance, co-starring with Judy Holliday. He toured in the production for two years, appearing alongside a young Mario Lanza. Warner Bros. In 1948, O'Brien signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros., who cast him in the screen version of Lillian Hellman's Another Part of the Forest. This starred Fredric March, who also appeared with O'Brien in An Act of Murder (1948). He was then cast as the undercover police officer in White Heat (1949) opposite James Cagney. "He [Cagney] said he had only one rule," O'Brien noted. "He would tap his heart and he would say, "Play it from here, kid." He always did and I believe it's the best rule for any performer. He could play a scene 90 ways and never repeat himself. He did this to keep himself fresh. I try to do this whenever possible." In 1949, 3,147 members of the Young Women's League of America, a national charitable organisation of spinsters, voted that O'Brien had more "male magnetism" than any other man in America today. "All women adore ruggedness," said organisation President Shirley Connolly. "Edmund O'Brien's magnetic appearance and personality most fully stir women's imaginative impulses. We're all agreed that he has more male magnetism than any of the 60,000,000 men in the United States today. (Runners