[2] Scott intended to follow his father into medicine,[3] but after attending the University of Texas at Austin, he dropped out at age 19 and worked as a seaman on an England-bound freighter.

[9] Jack L. Warner saw Scott perform in Those Endearing Young Charms and signed him to his first film contract,[4] which led to his screen debut in The Mask of Dimitrios (1944).

Back at Warners, Scott was cast in Mildred Pierce (1945) and received much acclaim for his performance as the duplicitous lover of both Joan Crawford and her daughter, and his mysterious murder forms the basis of the plot and frames the film's opening and closing.

"[11] Scott co-starred with Faye Emerson in Danger Signal (1945) and was with Janis Paige and Dane Clark in Her Kind of Man (1946).

After being dropped by Warners, Scott appeared on a variety of television series such as Armstrong Circle Theatre (1950) and Pulitzer Prize Playhouse (1951).

He made the occasional film such as Treasure of Ruby Hills (1955), Shotgun (1955), Flame of the Islands (1956), The Counterfeit Plan (1957), and Man in the Shadow (1957); the last two were shot in Britain.

Scott's last roles included It's Only Money (1962) with Jerry Lewis, the TV movie The Expendables (1962), and episodes of The Doctors and the Nurses (1962) and The Rogues (1965).

During his time at Warner's, Scott and his first wife Elaine socialized regularly with Angela Lansbury and her husband Richard Cromwell.

Possibly as a result of these developments or due to a box-office slump, Scott succumbed to depression, which affected his acting for Warners.

[4][citation needed] Scott died on October 3, 1965, from a malignant brain tumor at the home of his mother in Austin, Texas at the age of 51.

Two streets in the Austin area are named in his memory: at the old airport Mueller Redevelopment and in unincorporated southeast Travis County.