Best Actor in 1927
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George was the son of the San Francisco Chief of Police who became a college athlete. He was the Heavyweight Boxing Champion of the Pacific Fleet during World War I. In the early 1920s, George wound up in Hollywood where he worked as a stuntman and part time actor. In 1924, Director John Ford picked virtually unknown George to star in his first picture, The Iron Horse (1924). Over the next two years, he would appear in four more Ford films and would co-star with Janet Gaynor in The Blue Eagle (1926) and Sunrise (1927). "Sunrise," a winner of two Academy Awards, was the story of a simple farmer who lets another woman talk him into murdering his wife. George remained popular until sound came along. By that time, his popularity was sliding, but he did make the transition to sound. With his rugged looks and physical size, he was soon a Western Cowboy Star. He was in some of the best stories ever written, Riders of the Purple Sage (1931), and in some of the worst. But he was consistently in the Top Ten money-making Western Stars. He would appear in a few films outside the horse set, such as Ever Since Eve (1934), but those roles would be few. By the end of the 1930s, George was still a popular 'B' movie Cowboy Star, but he would not take the parts as seriously as he did a decade before. During World War II, he hung up his spurs, and he re-enlisted in the Navy where he fought in the Pacific and was decorated many times. After the war, when he would not find work in acting, John Ford, his old Director, would give him work with the cavalry in three of his films.(Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans)- Actor
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Although his parents were deaf, Leonidas Chaney became an actor and also owner of a theatre company (together with his brother John). He made his debut at the movies in 1912, and his filmography is vast. Lon Chaney was especially famous for his horror parts in movies like e.g. Quasimodo in The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923). Due to his special make-up effects he carried the characterization to be "the man with the thousand faces." He only filmed one movie with sound: The remake of one of his earlier films The Unholy Three (1930). His son, Lon Chaney Jr., became a famous actor of the horror genre.(The Unkown)- Actor
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Albert Dieudonné was born on 26 November 1889 in Paris, France. He was an actor and writer, known for Son crime (1921), Gloire rouge (1923) and Sous la griffe (1917). He died on 19 March 1976 in Boulogne-Billancourt, Hauts-de-Seine, France.(Napoléon vu par Abel Gance)- Writer
- Actor
- Music Department
While his special gifts seemed to lie in music and composing, the dapper, multi-talented Welsh actor Ivor Novello (ne David Ivor Davies), with his leading-man good looks, had a strong affinity for the camera.
Born in Cardiff, Wales, in 1893, he was the son of a tax-collector father and a well-known singing teacher mother. His prodigious musical skills were evident fairly early. Trained at the Magdalen College Choir School on a soprano scholarship, he soon began writing songs under the name Ivor Novello. In his overall career, Novello would write over 250 songs, a large percentage of them uplifting, touchingly sentimental and war-inspired morale boosters. He moved with his family to London in 1914, and became an overnight celebrity after composing the patriotic World War I standard "Keep the Home Fires Burning," which was introduced much later in the film The Lost Squadron (1932).
Novello then switched to pursue acting and debuted with a role in The Call of the Blood (1921) [The Call of the Blood], a French romantic melodrama which earned him promising notices. Other roles that ensured his status as a screen idol followed, including The Man Without Desire (1923), which he produced. He wrote and appeared in the successful 1924 play "The Rat," which transferred quite well to film the following year (The Rat (1925)). This also inspired two sequels -- The Triumph of the Rat (1926) and The Return of the Rat (1929).
The actor's film peak occurred headlining two of Alfred Hitchcock's early suspense thrillers, serving as the put-upon protagonist in both the silent classic The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog (1927) and the lesser-received Downhill (1927). Novello had a fine, well-modulated speaking voice that transferred easily to talkies. Into the 1930s, he wrote and starred in Symphony in Two Flats (1930) and went on to remake The Phantom Fiend (1932) successfully. During this time he also wrote the dialogue for Tarzan the Ape Man (1932), the first of the jungle series to star Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O'Sullivan. Novello's last film was Autumn Crocus (1934), after which he decided to devote himself full time to music and theater.
He went on to earn rave reviews for his opulent, romantically melodramatic stagings of "Glamorous Night" (1935), "The Dancing Years" (1939) and "Perchance to Dream" (1945). He wrote eight musicals in all and appeared in six of them, all of them non-singing parts.
His longtime companion of 35 years, actor Robert Andrews, was with Novello when Novello died suddenly on March 6, 1951 of a coronary thrombosis only hours after performing in his own play "The King's Rhapsody." Hugely popular in his time (though virtually unknown in America), Novello's lasting influence on film, theater and especially music cannot be denied.(The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog)- George Bancroft was raised in Philadelphia and attended high school at Tomes Institute (Philadelphia). He won an impressive appointment to the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis and graduated as a commissioned officer. He served in the Navy for the prescribed period of required service but no more. He decided to turn to show business, first as a theater manager. He worked in the old and fading minstrel show variety format into the 1920s but then decided to try his hand at acting. By 1923, he was good enough for Broadway and spent about a year there doing two plays. But he was already good enough for some early camera work for by 1921, so he had made his first appearance in the silent movie medium. Being a big man with dark features, he was a natural for heavies. And it seemed that early Westerns were an easy fit as well after his first four films. Through 1924 and into 1925, he did four, culminating with pay dirt in his appealing performance as rogue Jack Slade in the James Cruze Western The Pony Express (1925). With him was another up-and-coming character actor, Wallace Beery. Bancroft's acting made Paramount Pictures take a look at him as star material. His roles as tough guy took on more flesh into the later 1920s, especially in association with director Josef von Sternberg and his well-honed gangster films that started with Underworld (1927). Their work culminated with Sternberg's Thunderbolt (1929) for which Bancroft received an Oscar nomination. He was tops at the box office.
Bancroft's various on-screen personas as bigger-than-life strong man was not far from his off-screen character as Hollywood notability got to him. It was recalled that he became more difficult to deal with as his ego grew. At one point, he refused to obey a director's order that he fall down after being shot by the villain. Bancroft declared, "One bullet can't kill Bancroft!" Although he stayed busy through the 1930s, he was older and stouter -- the stuff of featured characters. And Bancroft was also getting a lot of competition from younger character actors. In the early '30s, his roles continued to typecast him as lead heavies, but increasingly, he was cast as second tier -- if with more variety -- in later roles. He was paper editor MacWade in Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936); a doctor in A Doctor's Diary (1937); a few sea captains along the way; and most memorably Marshal Curly Wilcox in the John Ford Western (his first with sound) Stagecoach (1939). Here he is particularly engaging tough lawman but with a big heart. Into the 1940s, he only did a handful of films. But he again had a rogue's spotlight with another name director -- Cecil B. DeMille -- in one of his always epic yarns. This time it was a Texas Ranger chasing a murderer over the Canadian border in North West Mounted Police (1940) with a stellar cast including Gary Cooper, everybody's favorite blond Madeleine Carroll, and Paulette Goddard as fleeing criminal, Jacques Corbeau's (Bancroft) daughter. By 1942, Bancroft had decided to move on, retiring with the intention of becoming a Southern California rancher. He quietly assumed this new role for a long run of 14 years before his passing.(Underworld) - Actor
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Born in London, England to Charlotte Mary (opera singer) and George Alfred Brook. He was educated privately. Stage experience included: "Oliver Twist", "Voysey Inheritence", "If I were King", "Importance of Being Ernest", Fair and Warmer", "Over Sunday", "Clothes and the WOman", and many others. Screen experience with Graham-Cutts Company in London. He appeared in "Woman to Woman", and others. In 1924 he came to America.(Barbed Wire)- Actor
- Soundtrack
During World War I, Richard Arlen served in the Royal Canadian Flying Corps as a pilot, but he never saw combat. After the war he drifted round and eventually wound up in Los Angeles, where he got a job as a motorcycle messenger at a film laboratory. When he crashed into the gates of Paramount Pictures and suffered a broken leg, the studio provided prompt medical attention. Impressed by his good looks, executives also gave him a contract after he had recovered. Starting as an extra in 1925, Arlen soon rose to credited roles, but the quality of his work left much to be desired. However, he continued in films, and his big break came when William A. Wellman cast him as a pilot in the silent film Wings (1927) with Charles 'Buddy' Rogers and Clara Bow. The story of fighter aces would win the Oscar for Best Picture and Arlen would continue to play the tough, cynical hero throughout his career. Arlen appeared in three more pictures directed by Wellman, Beggars of Life (1928), Ladies of the Mob (1928) and The Man I Love (1929). In "Wings" he had a scene with a young actor named Gary Cooper. In 1929, he again worked with Cooper in the western The Virginian (1929), only this time Cooper was the star and Arlen was the supporting actor. While Arlen moved easily into sound, his career just bumped along. By 1935 he was working in such "B" pictures as Three Live Ghosts (1936). It was in 1935 that he became a freelance actor and his freelance career soon waned. In 1939, he signed with Universal and began working in its action films. In 1941 he moved to the Pine-Thomas unit at Paramount, where he appeared in adventure films. With the war on, most of his earlier films included war scenarios. By the end of the 1940s Arlen was becoming deaf and this seemed to signal the end of his career. However, he had an operation in 1949 that restored his hearing and he went on making a handful of adventures and westerns through the 1950s and working more in the 1960s. He made 15 westerns for producer A.C. Lyles, who worked with the old western stars.
Besides movies, Arlen also appeared on television and in commercials. After leaving the business in the late 1960s, he was coaxed back to the screen for three small roles in films that were released the same year that he died.(Wings)- Actor
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John Gilbert was born into a show-business family - his father was a comic with the Pringle Stock Company. By 1915 John was an extra with Thomas H. Ince's company and a lead player by 1917. In those days he was assistant director, actor or screenwriter. He also tried his hand at directing. By 1919 he was being noticed in films and getting better roles. In 1921 he signed a three-year contract with Fox Films. His popularity continued to soar and he was turning from villain to leading man. In 1924 he signed with MGM which put him into His Hour (1924). In 1925 he appeared in the very successful The Big Parade (1925) and was, by now, as popular as Rudolph Valentino. Lillian Gish, who had a new contract with MGM, picked Gilbert to co-star with her in La Bohème (1926). With the death of Valentino, his only competition, John was on top of the world. Then came Greta Garbo, who starred with him in Love (1927), Flesh and the Devil (1926) and A Woman of Affairs (1928). The screen chemistry between these two was incredible and led to a torrid off-screen affair. The studio publicity department worked overtime to publicize the romance between the two, but when it came time to marry, John was left at the altar. His performances after that were devoid of the sparkle that he once had and he began to drink heavily. Added to that, the whole industry was moving towards sound, and while his voice was not as bad as some had thought, it did not match the image that he portrayed on the screen. Even his characters had changed, in such films as Redemption (1930) and Way for a Sailor (1930). He was no longer the person that bad things happened to, but he now was the cause of bad things which happen. MGM did little to help John adjust to the new sound medium, as studio chief Louis B. Mayer and Gilbert had a fierce and nasty confrontation over Garbo. John was still under contract to MGM for a very large salary, but the money meant little to him. His contract ran out in 1933 after he appeared in Fast Workers (1933) as a riveter.
Garbo tried to restore some of his image when she insisted that he play opposite her in Queen Christina (1933), but by then it was too late. He appeared in only one more film and died of a heart attack in January 1936.(Love)- Actor
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Gustav Fröhlich was born on 21 March 1902 in Hanover, Germany. He was an actor and director, known for Metropolis (1927), Leb' wohl, Christina (1945) and Seine Tochter ist der Peter (1955). He was married to Maria Hajek and Gitta Alpar. He died on 22 December 1987 in Lugano, Ticino, Switzerland.(Metropolis)- Actor
- Director
Edmond Van Daële was born on 11 August 1884 in Paris, France. He was an actor and director, known for Three Musketeers (1932), Six et demi onze (1927) and Cagliostro - Liebe und Leben eines großen Abenteurers (1929). He died on 11 March 1960 in Grez-Neuville, Maine-et-Loire, France.(Napoléon vu par Abel Gance)