John Carradine

One of our most prolific character actor, during his 57 year career, John Carradine earned more than 300 film and television credits. It is dispute whether he or Donald Crisp appeared in more films than any other actor.




John Carradine was born Richmond Reed Carradine on February 5, 1906 in New York City, the son of of Genevieve Winifred, a surgeon, and William Reed Carradine, a correspondent for the Associated Press.

John Carradine made his film debut in 1930 in Bright Lights.

A favorite of director John Ford, John Carradine appeared in eleven of Ford's films: The Prisoner of Shark Island (1934), Mary of Scotland (1936), The Hurricane (1937) Submarine Patrol (1938), Four Men and a Prayer (1938), Stagecoach (1939), Drums Along the Mohawk (1939), The Grapes of Wrath (1940), The Last Hurrah (1958), The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962) and Cheyenne Autumn (1964).





A few of John Carradine's most notable film credits include The Invisible Man (1933),Captains Courageous (1937), Jesse James (1939), The Three Musketeers (1939), The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939), Five Came Back (1939), The Return of Frank James (1940), Man Hunt (1941), The Adventures of Mark Twain (1944), The Court Jester (1955), The Ten Commandments (1956), and Around the World in Eighty Days (1956).




Four of John Carradine's five sons became actors: David Carradine, Robert Carradine, Keith Carradine, and Bruce Carradine.




John Carradine appeared in several episodes of Kung Fu with son David Carradine.

In The Long Riders (1981) he appeared with sons Keith, Robert and David.

John Carradine was known for playing dark evil sinister characters. However, in a very different role, John Carradine won a Daytime Emmy in 1985 for Outstanding Performer in a Children's Program for "Young People's Specials" for the episode "Umbrella Jack".

John Carradine also had a significant Broadway career. He made his Broadway debut in The Duchess of Malfi. His Broadway credits include Galileo, Volpone, Frankenstein, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, The Time of Your Life,
The Madwoman of Chaillot, The Leading Lady, and The Cup of Trembling.

For his contribution to the motion picture industry, John Carradine has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.




In 2003, he was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.




On November 27, 1988, John Carradine died of natural causes in Milan, Italy at age 82. His final words were: "Milan: What a beautiful place to die".

John Forsythe

John Forsythe was born John Lincoln Freund on January 29, 1918 in Penns Grove, New Jersey. The son of Samuel Jeremiah Freund, a stockbroker and Blance Materson. John grew up in Brooklyn, New York.




During World War II, John Forsythe served with the US Army Corps. During World War II he also worked with injured soldiers who had developed speech problems.




After World War II, he became a baseball announcer and a drama teacher. Joan Collins would co-star opposite him on Dynasty (1981), was one of his drama students.

In 1943, he signed a contract with Warner Brothers and made his film debut in Northern Pursuit (1943) and his second film was Destination Tokyo (1943). During the 1940s and 1950s he also appeared in The Captive City (1952), The Glass Web (1953), Escape from Fort Bravo (1953), The Trouble With Harry (1955), and The Ambassador's Daughter (1956).




During the 1950s, John Forsythe was a familiar face on television appearing in episodes of Robert Montgomery Presents, Suspense, Kraft Television Theater, and Studio One.

In 1957, John Forsythe was cast to play single father Bentley Gregg in the sitcom Bachelor Father. The show would run for 157 episodes and four seasons ending in 1962.




During the 1960s, John appeared in such films as Madame X (1966), In Cold Blood (1967) and Topaz (1969). He also frequently appeared on television, making appearances in Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre, The Dick Powell Show and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour.

In 1965, John Forsythe starred in the short lived The John Forsythe Show.

The 1970s brought John Forsythe one of his most famous roles, as the unseen millionaire Charles Townsend on the 1970s crime drama Charlie's Angels (1976–1981).




The 1980s brought John Forsythe another famous role, as patriarch Blake Carrington in Dynasty (1981-1989). This role would bring Forsythe three Emmy nominations for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series. He was also nominated six times for a Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Drama Series, winning in 1983 and 1984. In 1984, he also won a Soap Opera Digest Award for his performance as Blake Carrington.




During the 1990s, he appeared as Sen. William Franklin Powers in the short lived series The Powers That Be.

At age 82, he would once again play Charles Townsend in the movie Charlie's Angels (2000) and would reprise the role in Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003).




John Forsythe owned and bred Thoroughbred racehorses for many years and was a member of the Board of Directors of Hollywood Park Racetrack. He was the recipient of the 1988 Eclipse Award of Merit for his contibution in promoting the sport of Thoroughbred racing.

John Forsythe has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for television.

Ernest Borgnine

Ernest Borgnine's career has spanned over five decades. He is known for his gruff, but gentle voice. At the age of 93, Ernest Borgnine is still active in both films and television.

Ernest Borgnine was born Ermes Effron Borgnine on January 24, 1917 in Hamden, Connecticut. The son of Charles Borgnine and Anna Boselli who had emigrated from Carpi (near Modena) Italy.

As an only child, Ernest enjoyed most sports, especially boxing, but took no real interest in acting. At 18, after graduating from high school in New Haven, and undecided about his future career, he joined the navy, where he stayed for ten years until leaving in 1945. During World War II he reached the rank of Gunner's Mate 1st Class. Ernest's military decorations included the American Campaign Medal, the Good Conduct Medal, the American Defense Service Medal with Fleet Clasp, and the World War II Victory Medal.

In 2004, Borgnine received the honorary rank of Chief Petty Officer from the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy Terry D. Scott—the US Navy's highest ranking enlisted sailor at the time—for Borgnine's support of the Navy and naval families worldwide.





After leaving the Navy, Ernest Borgnine worked a variety of factory jobs. His mother suggested that his forceful personality could make him suitable for a career in acting, and Borgnine promptly enrolled at the Randall School of Drama in Hartford. After completing the course he joined Robert Porterfield's famous Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Virginia, staying there for four years, undertaking odd jobs and playing every type of role imaginable.

Ernest Borgnine's big break came in 1949, when he made his acting debut on Broadway playing a male nurse in "Harvey".

In 1951 Ernest Borgnine moved to Los Angeles to pursue a movie career, and made his film debut as Bill Street in The Whistle at Eaton Falls (1951).

Ernest Borgnine's big movie break came when he was cast in the role of Sgt. "Fatso" Judson in From Here to Eternity (1953).




Ernest Borgnine's film credits include Johnny Guitar (1954), Vera Cruz (1954), Bad Day at Black Rock (1955), Marty (1955), The Last Command (1955), The Catered Affair (1956), The Badlanders (1958), Torpedo Run (1958), The Flight of the Phoenix (1965), The Dirty Dozen (1967), Ice Station Zebra (1968), The Wild Bunch (1969), The Revengers (1972), The Poseidon Adventure (1972), Law and Disorder (1974), Convoy (1978), Escape from New York (1981), Moving Target (1988), The Long Ride Home (2003) and Another Harvest Moon (2008).




Ernest Borgnine won the Academy Award for Best Actor and the Golden Globe for Best Actor for his performance in Marty (1955).

On television, he is best known for playing Quinton McHale in the 1962-66 series McHale's Navy and the mid 1980s action series Airwolf.




He also provided the voice of the character Mermaid Man in the series, SpongeBob SquarePants and the voice of Carface in All Dogs Go to Heaven.

He has also appeared on A Grandpa For Christmas, 7th Heaven, Touched by an Angel, Walker, Texas Ranger, JAG and Murder She Wrote.

In 2009, at the age of 92 he was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series for his performance on ER.

Ernest Borgnine was the very first "center square" on "The Hollywood Squares" (1965).

Ernest Borgnine is an active Freemason and is presently the Honorary Chairman of the Scottish Rite RiteCare Program, which sponsors 175 Scottish Rite Childhood Language Disorders Clinics, Centers, and Programs nationwide.


Ernest Borgnine has a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for motion pictures.




Ernest Borgnine is still active and will be in two movies debuting in 2010: Red and Snatched.

Dead End Kids

In 1934, Sidney Kingsley wrote a play about a group of children growing up on the streets of New York City. A total of fourteen children were hired to play various roles in the play entitled Dead End. The play opened at the Belasco Theatre on October 28, 1935 and ran for two years, totalling 684 performances.

Samuel Goldwyn and director William Wyler saw the play and decided to turn it into a film. They paid $165,000 for the rights to the film and began auditioning actors in Los Angeles.

Failing to find actors that could convey the emotions they saw in the play, Goldwyn and Wyler hired six of the original Kids (Billy Halop, Bobby Jordan, Huntz Hall, Bernard Punsly, Gabriel Dell, and Leo Gorcey) to star in the film. The Kids were all signed to two-year contracts, allowing for possible future films, and began working on the 1937 United Artists' film, Dead End.

The Dead End Kids only made one movie for Goldwyn. During production, the boys ran wild around the studio, destroying property, including crashing a truck into a sound stage. Goldwyn chose not to use them again and sold their contract to Warner Brothers.




At Warner Brothers, the Dead End Kids made six films including Angels with Dirty Faces (1938). The last one was in 1939, when they were released from their contracts due to more antics on the studio lot.




The Dead End Kids proved to be so popular that they continued to make movies under various names, including The East Side Kids, The Little Tough Guys, and The Bowery Boys, until 1958.

In total, the various teams that made up 'The Dead End Kids' a total of 89 films and three serials for four different studios during their 21 year long film career.

The team was awarded a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame for motion pictures in February, 1994. Sadly, only Bernard Punsly and Huntz Hall of the original Dead End Kids attended as they were the only surviving Dead End Kids.

The original Dead End Kids in the films were Billy Halop (Tommy), Bobby Jordan (Angel), Huntz Hall (Dippy), Bernard Punsly (Milty), Gabriel Dell (T.B.), and Leo Gorcey (Spit).

Billy Halop (Tommy) was born on February 11, 1920 and died on November 9, 1976. Billy Halop made 67 movies and television shows during his 38 year career. In his later years, he had a reoccurring role on All in the Family as Bert Munson.



Billy Halop's sister Florence Halop is most known for her role as Flo on the televsion sitcom Night Court.




Bobby Jordan (Angel) was the youngest Dead End Kid born on April 1, 1923. Bobby died on September 10, 1965. He appeared in 69 films and television shows from 1937 to 1961. Bobby's credits include Bonanza, Route 66, Maverick, and Treasure of Monte Cristo (1949).




Henry Richard "Huntz" Hall (Dippy) was born on August 15, 1919. Huntz died on January 30, 1999. He appeared in 116 films and television shows from 1937 to 1993. Huntz appeared on Different Strokes, Flipper, and Herbie Rides Again (1974).




Bernard Punsly (Milty) was born on July 11, 1923. Bernard retired in 1943 after making 19 films. He left show business and became a physician. When Huntz Hall died in 1999, Punsly became the last surviving cast member of the Dead End Kids.




Gabriel Dell (T.B.) was born on October 8, 1919 and died on July 3, 1988. He appeared in 81 films and television shows from 1937 to 1982. He went on to appear in Earthquake (1974), Barney Miller, Sanford and Son, and I Dream of Jeanie.




Leo B. Gorcey (Spit) was the oldest Dead End Kid born on June 3, 1917. He died on June 2, 1961. Leo appeared in 90 films and television shows from 1937 to 1966, including playing the First Cab Driver in It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (1963). He also appeared in Invisible Stripes (1939) and Docks of New York (1945). Leo's father was actor Bernard Gorcey. Leo's brother David Gorcey also became a Dead End Kid.

Dana Andrews

Dana Andrews was a leading man of the 1940s and 1950s, and despite an impressive career he has never been award a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Dana Andrews was born Carver Dana Andrews on January 1, 1909 in Covington County, Mississippi. The son of Charles Forrest Andrews, a Baptist minister and Annis Speed.

Dana Andrews studied business administration at Sam Houston State Teachers College in Texas, but took a bookkeeping job with Gulf Oil in 1929 prior to graduating.

In 1931 he hitchhiked to California, hoping to get work as an actor. Dana's early jobs included digging ditches, driving a school bus, picking oranges, a stock boy and pumping gas.

Dana's employer at a Van Nuys gas station believed in him and agreed to invest in him, asking to be repaid if and when Andrews made it as an actor. Van Nuys was right, Dana had something special.

Andrews studied opera and also entered the Pasadena Community Playhouse, the famed theatre company and drama school. Although, the movies did not really capture on Dana Andrew's singing voice.

In 1940, Dana Andrews made his film debut in The Westerner.




Dana Andrews most memorable roles were as the gangster in the 1941 comedy Ball of Fire, playing a lynching victim in The Ox Bow Incident (1943), and a soldier returning home in The Best Years of Our Lives (1946).



Dana Andrews signature role was in the 1944 film noir Laura, playing an obsessed detective opposite Gene Tierney.

He appeared with actress Gene Tierney in five films: Tobacco Road (1941), Belle Starr (1941), Laura (1944), The Iron Curtain (1948) and Where the Sidewalk Ends (1950).





Dana Andrews also appeared in State Fair (1945) The Iron Curtain (1948) Three Hours to Kill (1954) Beyond a Reasonable Doubt (1956) In Harm's Way (1965) The Devil's Brigade (1968) and Airport 1975 (1974).

Dana Andrews served as President of the Screen Actors Guild from 1963 to 1965.

Dana Andrews was one of the first to speak out against the degradation of the acting profession, particularly actresses doing nude scenes just to get a role.

Dana Andrews is one of the first actors to do a public service announcement about alcoholism, having battled alcoholism himself.

Dana Andrews married Mary Todd on November 17, 1939 and they were married until his death, 53 years.




Dana Andrews died on December 17, 1992 of pneumonia complicated by by congestive heart failure.

Humphrey Bogart

Humphrey DeForest Bogart was born on December 25, 1899 in New York City. He was the first child of Belmont Bogart,a surgeon and Maud Humphrey, a commericial illustrator.

Humphrey Bogart's career began as a model for Mellins Baby Food. His mother used a drawing of baby Humphrey in a well-known ad campaign for Mellins Baby Food.




From his father, Bogart inherited a tendency for needling people, a fondness for fishing, a life-long love of sailing, and an attraction to strong-willed women.

In 1918, Humphrey Bogart followed his love for the sea and enlisted in the United States Navy in the spring of 1918 and served during World War I.

It was during his naval stint that Bogart may have gotten his trademark scar and developed his characteristic lisp.

Humphrey Bogart had been raised to believe acting was beneath a gentleman, but he enjoyed stage acting. He never took acting lessons, but was persistent and worked steadily at his craft. He appeared in at least seventeen Broadway productions between 1922 and 1935. He appeared in such productions as Drifting (his first Broadway play), Meet the Wife, Saturday's Children, Our Wife, Invitation to Murder and The Petrified Forest.

Humphrey Bogart's film debut was in The Dancing Town (1928).

In 1936, Humphrey Bogart got his big break when he was cast as Duke Mantee (a role he originated on Broadway) in the film version of The Petrified Forest. Originally the studio wanted Edward G. Robinson for the role of Duke Mantee. But Leslie Howard campaigned for Humphrey Bogart and won. Bogart never forgot Leslie Howard for this favor.




Humphrey Bogart starred in such classic films as Marked Woman (1937), Angels with Dirty Faces (1938), Dark Victory (1939), They Drive by Night (1940), High Sierra (1941), The Maltese Falcon (1941), Casablanca (1942), Sahara (1943), Passage to Marseille (1944), To Have and Have Not (1944), Conflict (1945), The Big Sleep (1946),
Dark Passage (1947), The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), Key Largo (1948),
In a Lonely Place (1950), The African Queen (1951), The Caine Mutiny (1954),
Sabrina (1954), The Barefoot Contessa (1954), and The Desperate Hours (1955).




Humphrey Bogart's final film was The Harder They Fall (1956).

Humphrey Bogart was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor for The Caine Mutiny and Casablanca.

He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for The African Queen.




Humphrey Bogart has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for motion pictures.

While filming To Have and Have Not, Bogart met Lauren Bacall. When they met, Bacall was nineteen and Bogart was forty five.




Bogart and Bacall then married in a small ceremony at the country home of Bogart's close friend, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Louis Bromfield at Malabar Farm in Lucas, Ohio on May 21, 1945.

Bogart and Bacall had two children: Stephen Humphrey Bogart, named after Bogart's character's nickname in To Have and Have Not, and Leslie Howard Bogart, named after actor Leslie Howard, who had been killed in World War II.




Humphrey Bogart rarely appeared on television. However, he and Lauren Bacall appeared on Edward R. Murrow's Person to Person. Bogart was also featured on The Jack Benny Show.

Bogart performed radio adaptations of some of his best known films, such as Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon. He also recorded a long-running radio series called Bold Venture with Lauren Bacall.

Bogart was an excellent chess player, almost of master strength. Before he made any money from acting, he would hustle players for dimes and quarters, playing in New York parks and at Coney Island. The chess scenes in Casablanca had not been in the original script, but were put in at his insistence. During World War II, Bogart would play chess with the servicemen by mail.

Bogart is credited with five of the American Film Institute's top 100 quotations in American cinema, the most by any actor:

5th: "Here's looking at you, kid" – Casablanca
14th: "The stuff that dreams are made of." – The Maltese Falcon
20th: "Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship." – Casablanca
43rd: "We'll always have Paris." – Casablanca
67th: "Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine." – Casablanca

Ranked #1 on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest screen actors.

Frank Sinatra's group of friends known as The Rat Pack was actually originally a group of Bogart's friends, including Sinatra, who enjoyed drinking heavily.

They referred to themselves as The Holmby Hills Rat Pack, derived from the Holmby Hills section of Hollywood where the Bogarts lived.

The origin of the term The Rat Pack was this: One morning, after a night of heavy drinking by Bogart and his friends, Bogart's wife Lauren Bacall walked into the room, looked at the group and flatly stated, "You look like a God-damned rat pack." Bogart enjoyed the term, and a legend was born.

Humphrey Bogart died at the age of 57 on January 14, 1957 of throat cancer.

Kirk Douglas

Kirk Douglas was born Issur Danielovitch on December 9, 1916 in Amsterdam, New York. The son of Bryna Sanglel and Herschel "Harry" Danielovitch, a businessman.



Coming from a poor family, as a boy, Kirk Douglas sold snacks to mill workers to earn enough to buy milk and bread. Later, he delivered newspapers and claims to have worked at more than forty jobs before becoming an actor.

During high school, he acted in school plays, and discovered "The one thing in my life that I always knew, that was always constant, was that I wanted to be an actor."

Kirk Douglas talked his way into St. Lawrence University and received a loan, which he paid back by working part-time as a gardener and a janitor. He was a standout on the wrestling team.

Kirk Douglas's acting talents were noticed at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City, and he received a special scholarship. One of his classmates was Betty Joan Perske (better known as Lauren Bacall), who would play an important role in launching his film career.



Graduating from drama school, Douglas made his Broadway debut as a singing telegraph boy in Spring Again. He would later appear in Broadway productions of The Three Sisters, Alice in Arms, Kiss and Tell, and Woman Bites Dog.

Kirk Douglas enlisted in the United States Navy in 1941, shortly after the United States entered World War II. He was medically discharged for war injuries in 1944.

After the war, Douglas returned to New York City and found work in radio theatre and commercials. Kirk Douglas had planned to remain a stage actor but Lauren Bacall helped him get his first screen role in the film The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946), starring Barbara Stanwyck.

Kirk Douglas most notable film roles include Out of the Past (1947), A Letter to Three Wives (1949), A Letter to Three Wives (1949), Champion (1949), Young Man with a Horn (1950), The Bad and the Beautiful (1952), 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954), Lust for Life (1956), Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957), Strangers When We Meet (1960), Spartacus (1960), Lonely Are the Brave (1962), Seven Days in May (1964), A Gunfight (1971), Posse (1975), and The Man from Snowy River (1982).



Kirk Douglas was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor for Lust of Life (1956), Champion (1949) and The Bad and the Beautiful (1952).

In 1996 he received an Honorary Oscar for Life Time Achievement. He also has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for motion pictures, which was stolen and later replaced.

Kirk Douglas received the AFI Life Achievement Award in 1991.

A frequent co-star of Burt Lancaster, they appeared in six movies: Tough Guys (1986), Seven Days in May (1964), The List of Adrian Messenger (1963), I Walk Alone (1948), Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957) and The Devil's Disciple (1959).

Kirk Douglas married twice, first to Diana Dill, on November 2, 1943. The couple had two sons, actor Michael Douglas and producer Joel Douglas. They divorced in 1951. He then married Anne Buydens on May 29, 1954. They had two sons, producer Peter Douglas and actor Eric Douglas. Kirk and Anne have been married 55 years.



In 1991, he survived a helicopter crash in which two people died. This sparked a search for meaning, which led him, after much study, to embrace the Judaism in which he was raised. He documented this spiritual journey in his book Climbing the Mountain: My Search for Meaning (2001).



Now retired, Kirk Douglas blogs regularly on his MySpace account. At 93, he is the oldest celebrity blogger.