He made his film debut in the two-reel comedy Follow That Music (1947), but after his Broadway success, he was invited to make his feature debut in The Journey (1959). He became a familiar face to movie audiences throughout the 1960s, notably for his performances in A Thousand Clowns (1965) repeating his stage performance, Hour of the Gun as Doc Holliday (1967), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968), and Once Upon a Time in the West (1968).