He returned to America for his film debut in Dragon Seed (1944), in which he and his co-stars (Katharine Hepburn, Akim Tamiroff, Aline MacMahon, Turhan Bey) portrayed Chinese peasants, some more convincingly than others.

As Oscar Wilde's ageless anti-hero, Hatfield received widespread acclaim for his dark good looks as much as for his acting ability.

"[4] His follow-up films, The Diary of a Chambermaid (1946), The Beginning or the End (1947), and The Unsuspected (1947), were successful, but Joan of Arc (1948) was a critical and financial failure.

[5] He appeared frequently on television and received an Emmy Award nomination for the Hallmark Hall of Fame videotaped play The Invincible Mr. Disraeli (1963).

Hatfield's other television credits include three guest appearances on Murder, She Wrote opposite his Picture of Dorian Gray costar Angela Lansbury, who had become a lifelong friend, and who had a home in County Cork.

In a twist on his Dorian role, his character starts as an old man who, upon entering a house inhabited by the ghost of his mother, is turned back into a youthful Confederate soldier.

[citation needed] According to the magazine Films in Review, Hatfield was ambivalent about having played Dorian Gray, feeling that it had typecast him.

[6] Having been introduced to Ireland by actress and former co-star Angela Lansbury, Hatfield lived at Ballinterry House, Rathcormac, County Cork from the early 1970s.