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John Qualen (born Johan Mandt Kvalen, December 8, 1899 – September 12, 1987) was a Canadian-American character actor of Norwegian heritage who specialized in Scandinavian roles.
Qualen was born in Vancouver, British Columbia, the son of immigrants from Norway; his father was a Lutheran minister and changed the family's original surname, "Kvalen", to "Qualen" – though some sources give Oleson, later Oleson Kvalen as Qualen's earlier surnames. His father's ministering meant many moves and John was 20 when he graduated from Elgin High School in 1920. Though he was awarded a scholarship to Northwestern University after he won an oratory contest he never attended college. In a Milwaukee Journal interview he said he needed to start working and did so with the Chattaqua Circuit. Eventually reaching Broadway, he gained his big break as the Swedish janitor in Elmer Rice's Street Scene. His movie career began when he recreated the role in the film version. This was followed by his appearance in John Ford's Arrowsmith (1931) which began a more than thirty year membership in the director's "stock company", with important supporting roles in The Searchers (1956), Two Rode Together (1961), The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962) and Cheyenne Autumn (1964).
Appearing in well over one hundred films, and acting extensively on television into the 1970s, Qualen performed many of his roles with various accents, usually Scandinavian, often intended for comic effect. Three of his more memorable roles showcase his versatility. Qualen assumed a Midwestern dialect as Muley, who recounts the destruction of his farm by the bank in Ford's The Grapes of Wrath (1940), and as the confused killer Earl Williams in Howard Hawks' classic comedy His Girl Friday (also 1940). As Berger, the jewelry-selling Norwegian resistance member in Michael Curtiz' Casablanca (1942), he essayed a light Scandinavian accent, but put on a thicker Mediterranean accent as the homeward-bound fisherman Locota in William Wellman's The High and the Mighty (1954)
Qualen was treasurer of The Authors Club and historian of The Masquers, Hollywood's social group for actors.
John Qualen was blind in his later years. He died of heart failure in 1987 in Torrance, California, and was interred in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale. He was survived by his three daughters.
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Sheldon Leonard Bershad (February 22, 1907 – January 11, 1997) was an American film and television actor, producer, director, and writer. Sheldon Leonard Bershad was born in Manhattan, New York City, the son of middle class Jewish parents Anna Levit and Frank Bershad. He graduated from Syracuse University in 1929.
As an actor, Leonard specialized in playing supporting characters, especially gangsters or "heavies", in films such as It's a Wonderful Life (1946; as bartender Nick), To Have and Have Not (1944), Guys and Dolls (1955), and Open Secret (1948). His trademark was his especially thick New York accent, usually delivered from the side of his mouth. In Decoy (1946), Leonard uses his "heavy" persona to create the hard-boiled police detective Joe Portugal.
On radio from 1945 to 1955, Leonard played an eccentric racetrack tout on The Jack Benny Program and later in the TV series of the same name. His role was to salute Benny out of the blue in railroad stations, on street corners, or in department stores ("Hey Bud. C'mere a minute."), ask Benny what he was about to do, and then proceed to try to argue him out of his course of action by resorting to inane and irrelevant racing logic. As "The Tout," he never gave out information on horse racing, unless Jack demanded it. One excuse the tout gave was, "Who knows about horses?"
Leonard was part of the cast of voice actors on the Damon Runyon Theatre radio show (1948-1949). He was part of the ensemble cast of the Martin and Lewis radio show. He also appeared frequently on The Adventures of the Saint, often playing gangsters and heavies, but also sometimes in more positive roles. Leonard was also a regular on the radio comedy series The Adventures of Maisie in the 1940s. During the 1950s, Leonard provided the voice of lazy fat cat Dodsworth in two Warner Bros. Merrie Melodies cartoons directed by Robert McKimson. In the adventure movie The Iroquois Trail (1950), Leonard played against type in the significant role of Chief Ogane, a Native American warrior, who pursues and fights the frontiersman Nat "Hawkeye" Cutler (George Montgomery) in a climactic duel to the death with knives.
Later in the 1950s and 1960s, he established a reputation as a producer of successful television series, including The Danny Thomas Show (aka Make Room For Daddy) (1953–64), The Andy Griffith Show (1960–68), Gomer Pyle U.S.M.C. (1964–69), The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961–66), and I Spy (1965–68). He also directed several TV series episodes, including four of the first eight episodes of the TV series Lassie (Season 1, 1954). Leonard also provided the voice of Linus the Lionhearted in a series of Post Crispy Critters cereal TV commercials in 1963-64, which led to a Linus cartoon series that aired on Saturday (and later, Sunday) mornings on CBS (1964–66) and ABC (1967–69). He also was briefly the star of his own television show Big Eddie (1975), where he played the owner of a large sports arena. The show lasted for only ten episodes.
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Vince Barnett (July 4, 1902 – August 10, 1977) was an American film and television actor. He appeared on stage originally.
Barnett's initial involvement with Hollywood was as a screenwriter, writing screenplays for the two-reeler movies of the late 1920s. He began appearing in films in 1930, playing hundreds of comedy bits and supporting parts. One of his more sizable screen roles was the moronic, illiterate gangster "secretary" in Scarface (1932). Among his best-regarded early roles, apart from Scarface, were The Big Cage (1933), Thirty Day Princess (1934) and Princess O'Hara (1935).
In later years, Barnett played straight character parts, often as careworn little men, undertakers, janitors, bartenders and drunks in pictures ranging from films noir (The Killers, 1946) to westerns (Springfield Rifle, 1952). He was a welcome presence in "B" comedies and mysteries: as Runyonesque gangsters in Petticoat Larceny (1943), Little Miss Broadway (1947), and Gas House Kids Go West (1947), and notably as Tom Conway's enthusiastic sidekick in The Falcon's Alibi (1946).
After World War II, with the Hollywood studios making fewer films, Barnett became a familiar face on television.
Grimes was born in New York City. His acting career began at age seven, during the depression, when he helped earn money for his family. He appeared as Jackie Grimes in the Broadway play The Old Maid, which won a Pulitzer Prize and ran for 10 months in New York. It then went on tour for another 11 months.
Grimes worked on radio, beginning with the CBS program Let's Pretend. He was also a regular on The Fred Allen Show, The Philip Morris Playhouse, Second Husband, CBS Radio Myster Theater, and Death Valley Days. By age 12, he was appearing on 35 to 40 radio shows a week.
In 1944, he moved to California to work for Universal. His credits include Fairytale Murder, Lady on a Train, and Week-End at the Waldorf. In the early 1950s, he switched to television. His credits include Alcoa Presents, Love of Life, The Aldrich Family, Tom Corbett, Space Cadet, Maude, On the Rocks, as well as All in the Family.
In 1962, Grimes and Peter Fernandez worked together on a series of records for MGM. Five years later, Fernandez hired him to do the voices of Sparky and Chim Chim on Speed Racer. He retired from acting in 1991.
James Wheaton Chambers was named after his maternal grandfather, James Wheaton Smith. Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, but grew up in Freehold, New Jersey. he eventually made his way to Hollywood in the late 1920s. Shortening his name to Wheaton Chambers, he would go on to appear in over 200 film and television productions during a career that spanned roughly three decades.
George Edwin Eldredge (September 10, 1898 – March 12, 1977) was an American actor who appeared in over 180 movies during a career that stretched from the 1930s to the early 1960s. He also had a prolific television career during the 1950s. He was the older brother of actor John Dornin Eldredge.
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Francis McDonald (August 22, 1891 – September 18, 1968) was an American actor whose career spanned 52 years.
McDonald's started acting professionally in stock theater with the Forepaugh Stock Company in Cincinnati. Following eight months with it, he worked one season with a stock company in Seattle, after which he performed for three seasons with a troupe in San Diego and Honolulu. He concluded his tenure in stock theater as juvenile leading man with the American Stock Company in Spokane, Washington.
By 1913 McDonald began to perform in the rapidly expanding film industry, initially working for Marion Leonard's Monopole Company in Hollywood. He was cast in over 280 films between 1913 and 1965, including The Temptress in 1926 with Greta Garbo. After he was designated "Hollywood's Prettiest Man," McDonald sought a tougher image by shaving his mustache and seeking roles of villains.
McDonald was one of Cecil B. DeMille's favorite character actors.[citation needed] DeMille gave him credited supporting roles in six of his films: The Plainsman (1936), The Buccaneer (1938), Union Pacific (1939), North West Mounted Police (1940), Samson and Delilah (1949), and The Ten Commandments (1956).
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Renie Riano (August 7, 1899 – July 3, 1971) was an English-born American actress who, with the exception of the Jiggs and Maggie comedies, had minor roles in 1940s-1950s films.
She was the daughter of Irene Riano (1871–1940), the daughter of Joseph Rice, a Philadelphia theatre owner, who, in the early 1890s, married vaudeville acrobat Robert Riano (b. 1867, Yonkers, New York – 1909, New York City). Irene Riano was a stage actress, the sole female member of vaudeville's popular Four Rianos acrobatic act, eccentric acrobat act which toured the world in vaudeville, variety and music halls, and the mother of actress Renie Riano. Irene was the daughter of Joseph Rice, a Philadelphia theatre owner. In the early 1890s, she married vaudeville acrobat Robert Riano (b. 1867, Yonkers, New York – 1909, New York City) who organised the famous "Four Rianos" eccentric acrobat act which toured the world in vaudeville, variety and music halls.