Gordon Scott played a string of classic heroes in the 1950s and 1960s including Samson, Hercules, Goliath, Zorro and Buffalo Bill in films where the heroes relied largely on their own strength and agility, rather than superpowers or an arsenal of military hardware. But for many who grew up in the 1950s Scott's defining role was as Tarzan.

He played the character in six films between 1955 and 1960. His Tarzan was a barrel-chested, very physical, slightly dim manifestation, though the earlier films still managed to present him as a jungle version on the average suburban American of the time, with wife Jane, son Boy and family pet Cheeta (who was not a cheetah, but a chimp).

What the films lacked in dialogue, plot and character, they made up for with their exotic flavour, Cheeta's unique comic charm and the intensity of the action, with Scott doing his own stunts. He recalled in one interview that he had to wrestle a 19-foot python, which the producers kept in a warm box to make it sleepy, but after several takes it was fully awake and presenting a serious challenge.

Half way through his run as Tarzan the franchise changed hands, the new producers decided on a slightly tougher approach and his last two films Tarzan's Greatest Adventure (1959), with a pre-Bond Sean Connery, and Tarzan the Magnificent (1960) are rated as being among the best in the series.

He was born Gordon Werschkul, into a German-American family, in Portland, Oregon, in 1927. He began bodybuilding in his mid-teens and was one of the few recruits to get a bespoke uniform when he joined the Army during the Second World War, because he was so big. He was 6 ft 3 in, with 19-inch biceps. In one interview he suggested the delay while waiting for his uniform saved his life as many of his peers finished training before he did and died in the Pacific.

He became a drill instructor and after the war managed a health club at a Las Vegas hotel. He was spotted while working out by a Hollywood talent scout and invited to meet producer Sol Lesser, who was looking for a replacement for Lex Barker as Tarzan and had tested 200 candidates without success.

"We met Lesser on a Wednesday, we tested Friday and Saturday, and I was signed Monday," Scott said. His surname was changed because it sounded too much like that of Johnny Weissmuller, who played Tarzan in the 1930s and 1940s.

After Tarzan the Magnificent Scott joined old friend Steve Reeves making sword-and-sandal movies in Italy, beginning with Romulus and Remus (1961). During the 1960s he worked consistently on such macho, adventure films, most of which are now largely forgotten. They had no great pretensions - Samson and the 7 Miracles of the World (1961) was set in Asia simply because the studio had Asian sets left over from Marco Polo, but they had a healthy international following at the time.

At the end of the 1960s Scott retired from films and returned to the United States. He was married to Vera Miles, his co-star in Tarzan's Hidden Jungle (1955). The marriage was short-lived.

Gordon Scott, actor, was born on August 3, 1927. He died on April 30, 2007, aged 79.