Alex Nicol (January 20, 1916 - July 29, 2001) was a film actor of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. The Blond-haired actor appeared in many tough-guy cowboys in Westerns including The Man from Laramie, in a memorable role as a bad guy that menaced Jimmy Stewart. He appeared in over 40 feature films as well as directing many TV shows including Wild Wild West, Tarzan and Daniel Boone. Nicol was a student of Lee Strasberg's Actors Studio in the 1940s which led to minor roles in the Broadway productions "South Pacific" and "Mister Roberts," the latter in which he served as understudy to Henry Fonda. He later appeared on Broadway in the role of 'Brick' in the Tennessee Williams 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof'. His first film role was in The Sleeping City (1950). He also appeared in (and directed) the film The Screaming Skull (1958), which was featured on the television series Mystery Science Theater 3000. In the 1960s he appeared in television programs including The Twilight Zone.

A sturdy, steadfast presence in two-fisted action during the 1950s, red-haired actor Alex Nicol trained at the Fagin School of Dramatic Art and began on the professional stage in 1938 as a young adult performing in Maurice Evans' Shakespearean company. Following WWII, he became a student of Lee Strasberg's Actors Studio which led to minor roles in the Broadway productions "South Pacific" and "Mister Roberts," the latter in which he served as understudy to Henry Fonda. In 1950, he launched his film career at Universal Studios in such films as Sleeping City, The (1950), his debut, and in Tomahawk (1951), his first of many oaters with Yvonne De Carlo, Van Heflin and an up-and-coming Rock Hudson. He continued in the same vein with standard decent "good guys" and simpering "bad guys" in Redhead from Wyoming, The (1953), Lone Hand (1953), Law and Order (1953), Dawn at Socorro (1954), and his best film, Man from Laramie, The (1955) in which he memorably menaced James Stewart (I). Television also brought him work with appearances in "Twilight Zone, The" (1959) and "Outer Limits, The" (1963), among others. In 1956, he replaced Ben Gazzara in the role of Brick in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" on Broadway. Unable to break out of his rugged secondary typecast, he tried his hand at directing, but nothing much came from it. His first lowbudget programmer is the semi-cult horror film Screaming Skull, The (1958) in which Nicol appeared in a cameo. In the 1960s, he went overseas and appeared in a handful of Spanish and Italian films, returning permanently to the US in the 1970s for additional TV and movie roles. He retired fully in 1987 and died in Montecito, California, in 2001 at the age of 85.