Louis Wolheim
Encyclopedia
Louis Wolheim was an American character actor
.
His trademark broken nose was the result of an injury sustained while playing football
for Cornell University
. Despite his rugged visage, Wolheim was intelligent and cultivated, speaking French, German, Spanish, and Yiddish
. He was also a mathematics teacher before entering silent films in 1914
. On the advice of Lionel Barrymore
, Wolheim entered films. He appeared in at least three films with Lionel's brother, John Barrymore
, Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde
(1920), Sherlock Holmes
(1922) and Tempest (1928). Wolheim's visage almost immediately typecast him in roles as gangsters, executioners (as in D. W. Griffith
's Orphans of the Storm
) or prisoners. Towards the end of the 1920s he occasionally broke out of these stereotypes and played a comic Russian officer in Tempest and a rambunctious Sergeant in Howard Hughes
's Two Arabian Knights
.
Wolheim acted primarily in silent film
s, because he died at the close of the silent era, but he also appeared in the talkies All Quiet on the Western Front and Danger Lights
(both 1930
) before he died.
Later in his career, about 1924, Wolheim went into the theater. He received considerable acclaim as Yank in the original stage production of The Hairy Ape
(1922) by Eugene O'Neill
.
According to the biography included in the DVD version of All Quiet on the Western Front, Wolheim wanted, at one point in his career, to play romantic leads instead of tough "heavies." To that end, he sought to have plastic surgery performed on his broken nose. Executives at United Artists
successfully obtained a restraining order
against him from doing so, however.
Wolheim died in 1931 in Los Angeles
, of stomach cancer
.
Character actor
A character actor is one who predominantly plays unusual or eccentric characters. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a character actor as "an actor who specializes in character parts", defining character part in turn as "an acting role displaying pronounced or unusual characteristics or...
.
His trademark broken nose was the result of an injury sustained while playing football
American football
American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
for Cornell University
Cornell University
Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...
. Despite his rugged visage, Wolheim was intelligent and cultivated, speaking French, German, Spanish, and Yiddish
Yiddish language
Yiddish is a High German language of Ashkenazi Jewish origin, spoken throughout the world. It developed as a fusion of German dialects with Hebrew, Aramaic, Slavic languages and traces of Romance languages...
. He was also a mathematics teacher before entering silent films in 1914
1914 in film
The year 1914 in film involved some significant events, including the debut of Cecil B. DeMille as a director.-Events:*The 3,300-seat Mark Strand Theatre opens in New York City....
. On the advice of Lionel Barrymore
Lionel Barrymore
Lionel Barrymore was an American actor of stage, screen and radio. He won an Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in A Free Soul...
, Wolheim entered films. He appeared in at least three films with Lionel's brother, John Barrymore
John Barrymore
John Sidney Blyth , better known as John Barrymore, was an acclaimed American actor. He first gained fame as a handsome stage actor in light comedy, then high drama and culminating in groundbreaking portrayals in Shakespearean plays Hamlet and Richard III...
, Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920 film)
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a 1920 horror silent film, produced by Famous Players-Lasky and released through Paramount/Artcraft. The film is based upon Robert Louis Stevenson's novella The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and starring actor John Barrymore.The film was directed by John S....
(1920), Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes (1922 film)
Sherlock Holmes is an American silent film starring John Barrymore as Holmes and Roland Young as Watson. The film was titled Moriarty in the UK.-Production background:...
(1922) and Tempest (1928). Wolheim's visage almost immediately typecast him in roles as gangsters, executioners (as in D. W. Griffith
D. W. Griffith
David Llewelyn Wark Griffith was a premier pioneering American film director. He is best known as the director of the controversial and groundbreaking 1915 film The Birth of a Nation and the subsequent film Intolerance .Griffith's film The Birth of a Nation made pioneering use of advanced camera...
's Orphans of the Storm
Orphans Of The Storm
Orphans of the Storm is a drama film by D. W. Griffith set in late 18th century France, before and during the French Revolution.This was the last Griffith film to feature Lillian and Dorothy Gish, and is often considered Griffith's last major commercial success, after boxoffice hits such as Birth...
) or prisoners. Towards the end of the 1920s he occasionally broke out of these stereotypes and played a comic Russian officer in Tempest and a rambunctious Sergeant in Howard Hughes
Howard Hughes
Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. was an American business magnate, investor, aviator, engineer, film producer, director, and philanthropist. He was one of the wealthiest people in the world...
's Two Arabian Knights
Two Arabian Knights
Two Arabian Knights is an American comedy film, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring William Boyd and Mary Astor. A silent film, Two Arabian Knights was produced by Howard Hughes and was distributed by United Artists.-Plot:...
.
Wolheim acted primarily in silent film
Silent film
A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. In silent films for entertainment the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures, pantomime and title cards...
s, because he died at the close of the silent era, but he also appeared in the talkies All Quiet on the Western Front and Danger Lights
Danger Lights
Danger Lights is a 1930 film starring Louis Wolheim, Robert Armstrong, and Jean Arthur.The plot concerns railroading on the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad, and the movie was largely filmed along that railroad's lines in Montana...
(both 1930
1930 in film
-Events:* November 1: The Big Trail featuring a young John Wayne in his first starring role is released in both 35mm, and a very early form of 70mm film and was the first large scale big-budget film of the sound era costing over $2 million. The film was praised for its aesthetic quality and realism...
) before he died.
Later in his career, about 1924, Wolheim went into the theater. He received considerable acclaim as Yank in the original stage production of The Hairy Ape
The Hairy Ape
-Plot :The play tells the story of a brutish, unthinking laborer known as Yank, as he searches for a sense of belonging in a world controlled by the rich...
(1922) by Eugene O'Neill
Eugene O'Neill
Eugene Gladstone O'Neill was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in Literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into American drama techniques of realism earlier associated with Russian playwright Anton Chekhov, Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, and Swedish...
.
According to the biography included in the DVD version of All Quiet on the Western Front, Wolheim wanted, at one point in his career, to play romantic leads instead of tough "heavies." To that end, he sought to have plastic surgery performed on his broken nose. Executives at United Artists
United Artists
United Artists Corporation is an American film studio. The original studio of that name was founded in 1919 by D. W. Griffith, Charles Chaplin, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks....
successfully obtained a restraining order
Restraining order
A restraining order or order of protection is a form of legal injunction that requires a party to do, or to refrain from doing, certain acts. A party that refuses to comply with an order faces criminal or civil penalties and may have to pay damages or accept sanctions...
against him from doing so, however.
Wolheim died in 1931 in Los Angeles
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, of stomach cancer
Stomach cancer
Gastric cancer, commonly referred to as stomach cancer, can develop in any part of the stomach and may spread throughout the stomach and to other organs; particularly the esophagus, lungs, lymph nodes, and the liver...
.
Filmography
- The Sin Ship (1931) - Captain Sam McVey
- Gentleman's Fate (1931) - Frank
- The Silver HordeThe Silver Horde (1930 film)The Silver Horde is a 1930 romantic drama film starring Joel McCrea, in his first leading role, as an Alaskan fisherman torn between two women, one good and the other bad . The title is a reference to salmon. It is the second film adaptation of the novel of the same name by Rex Beach...
(1930) - George Balt - Danger LightsDanger LightsDanger Lights is a 1930 film starring Louis Wolheim, Robert Armstrong, and Jean Arthur.The plot concerns railroading on the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad, and the movie was largely filmed along that railroad's lines in Montana...
(1930) - Dan Thorn - All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) - Stanislaus Katczinsky
- The Ship from Shanghai (1930) - Ted, the steward
- CondemnedCondemned (film)Condemned is an American black and white melodrama film. It stars Ronald Colman, Ann Harding, Dudley Digges, Louis Wolheim, William Elmer, and Wilhelm von Brincken. The movie was adapted by Sidney Howard from the novel by Blair Niles. It was directed by Wesley Ruggles...
(1929) - Jacques - Frozen Justice (1929) - Duke
- The Wolf SongThe Wolf SongThe Wolf Song, also known as Wolf Song, is a 1929 silent film with a synchronized score and sound effects directed by Victor Fleming and starring Gary Cooper and Lupe Vélez. This Pre-Code film is notable for showing full frontal nudity...
(1929) - Gullion - Square Shoulders (1929) - Slag Collins
- The Shady Lady (1928) - Professor Holbrook
- The AwakeningThe Awakening (1928 film)The Awakening is a feature film directed by Victor Fleming.-Cast:*Vilma Bánky as Marie Ducrot*Walter Byron as Count Karl von Hagen*Louis Wolheim as Le Bete*George Davis as The Orderly*William Orlamond as Grandfather Ducrot...
(1928) - Le Bete - The RacketThe RacketThe Racket is an American crime film directed by Lewis Milestone and starring Thomas Meighan, Marie Prevost, Louis Wolheim, and George E. Stone...
(1928) - Nick Scarsi - Tempest (1928) - Sgt. Bulba
- Sorrell and SonSorrell and SonSorrell and Son is a silent film released on December 2, 1927 and nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director in the 1st Academy Awards the following year...
(1927) - Buck - Two Arabian KnightsTwo Arabian KnightsTwo Arabian Knights is an American comedy film, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring William Boyd and Mary Astor. A silent film, Two Arabian Knights was produced by Howard Hughes and was distributed by United Artists.-Plot:...
(1927) - Sergeant Peter McGaffney - Lover's Island (1925) - Captain Joshua Dawson
- The Story Without a NameThe Story Without a NameThe Story Without a Name is a 1924 silent film melodrama directed by Irvin Willat and based on a novel by Arthur Stringer. It was produced by Famous Players-Lasky and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The film stars Agnes Ayres. Also known as Without Warning. This film is lost...
(1924) - Kurder - America (1924) - Capt. Hare
- The Uninvited GuestThe Uninvited Guest (1924 film)The Uninvited Guest was a drama film directed by Ralph Ince, and starring Maurice "Lefty" Flynn, Jean Tolley, Mary MacLaren, William Bailey, and Louis Wolheim...
(1924) - Jan Boomer - Unseeing Eyes (1923) - Laird
- Little Old New YorkLittle Old New York (1923 film)Little Old New York is a 1923 silent film historical drama starring Marion Davies and directed by Sidney Olcott. The film was produced by William Randolph Hearst's Cosmopolitan production unit. A copy is in the Library of Congress. -Cast:...
(1923) - The Hoboken Terror - The Go-GetterThe Go-getterCosmopolitan, and in the United Kingdom in the August 1931 Strand. Part of the Blandings Castle canon, it features the absent-minded peer Lord Emsworth, and was included in the collection Blandings Castle and Elsewhere , although the story takes place sometime between the events of Leave it to...
(1923) - Daniel Silver - Enemies of WomenEnemies of WomenEnemies of Women is a 1923 silent romantic drama film directed by Alan Crosland and starring Lionel Barrymore, Alma Rubens, Gladys Hulette, Pedro de Cordoba, and Paul Panzer. The film was produced by William Randolph Hearst through his Cosmopolitan Productions...
(1923) (scenes deleted) - Love's Old Sweet SongLove's Old Sweet SongLove's Old Sweet Song is an Irish folk song published in 1884 by composer James Lynam Molloy and lyricist G. Clifton Bingham.It has been recorded by many artists, including John McCormack and Clara Butt. It is alluded to in James Joyce's Ulysses as being sung by Molly Bloom....
(1923) - The Wanderer - The Last MomentThe Last MomentThe Last Moment is a silent experimental film conceived and directed by Paul Fejos. The film starred Otto Matieson and Georgia Hale....
(1923) - The Finn - The Face in the Fog (1922) - Petrus
- Sherlock HolmesSherlock Holmes (1922 film)Sherlock Holmes is an American silent film starring John Barrymore as Holmes and Roland Young as Watson. The film was titled Moriarty in the UK.-Production background:...
(1922) - Craigin - Determination (1922)
- Orphans of the StormOrphans Of The StormOrphans of the Storm is a drama film by D. W. Griffith set in late 18th century France, before and during the French Revolution.This was the last Griffith film to feature Lillian and Dorothy Gish, and is often considered Griffith's last major commercial success, after boxoffice hits such as Birth...
(1921) - Executioner - ExperienceExperience (1921 film)Experience is a silent drama morality/allegory film produced by Famous Players-Lasky and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The picture was directed by George Fitzmaurice and starred Richard Barthelmess, and was based on George V. Hobart's successful 1914 Broadway play of the same name...
(1921) - Crime - A Manhattan Knight (1920) - Mangus O'Shea
- Dr. Jekyll and Mr. HydeDr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920 film)Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a 1920 horror silent film, produced by Famous Players-Lasky and released through Paramount/Artcraft. The film is based upon Robert Louis Stevenson's novella The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and starring actor John Barrymore.The film was directed by John S....
(1920) (uncredited) - Music Hall Proprietor - Number 17 (1920)
- The Darkest Hour (1919) - Louis Marcotte
- The Carter Case (1919) - Emanon
- The Poor Rich Man (1918) - Wrestler
- A Pair of Cupids (1918) aka. Both Members (reissue title) - Dirk Thomas
- OpportunityOpportunityOpportunity may refer to:*Opportunity International - An International microfinance network that lends to the working poor*Opportunity NYC is the experimental Conditional Cash Transfer program being launched in New York City...
(1918) (uncredited) - A prizefight spectator - Peg of the Pirates (1918) - Flatnose Tim
- The House of HateThe House of HateThe House of Hate is a 1918 film serial directed by George B. Seitz, produced when many early film studios in America's first motion picture industry were based in Fort Lee, New Jersey....
(1918) - The Eyes of MysteryThe Eyes of MysteryThe Eyes of Mystery is a 1918 silent mystery film directed by Tod Browning.-Cast:* Edith Storey - Carma Carmichael* Bradley Barker - Jack Carrington* Harry Northrup - Roger Carmichael * Frank Andrews - Quincy Carmichael...
(1918) - Brad Tilton - The Avenging Trail (1917) - Lefty Reed
- The Eternal MotherThe Eternal MotherThe Eternal Mother is a 1912 short silent drama film directed by D. W. Griffith and starring Blanche Sweet. The film was shot in Fort Lee, New Jersey when Biograph Studios and other early film studios in America's first motion picture industry were based there at the beginning of the 20th...
(1917) - Bucky McGhee - The Belle of the Season (1917) - Johnson
- The Millionaire's DoubleThe Millionaire's DoubleThe Millionaire's Double is a 1917 silent American drama film directed by Harry Davenport, starring Lionel Barrymore and Evelyn Brent. The film is considered to be lost.- Cast :* Lionel Barrymore as Bide Bennington* Evelyn Brent as Constance Brent...
(1917) - Bob Holloway - The End of the Tour (1917)
- The Sunbeam (1916) - Biff the Brute
- The Brand of CowardiceThe Brand of CowardiceThe Brand of Cowardice is a 1916 silent film starring Lionel Barrymore and released thru Metro Pictures. It is a lost film. -Cast:*Lionel Barrymore - Cyril Hamilton*Grace Valentine - Marcia West*Robert Cummings - Colonel Gordon West*Kate Blancke - Mrs...
(1916) - Cpl. Mallin - Dorian's Divorce (1916) - Capt. Ross
- The Romance of ElaineThe Romance of ElaineThe Romance of Elaine is a 1915 silent adventure film serial directed by George B. Seitz, Leopold Wharton and Theodore Wharton. The film is considered to be lost.-Cast:* Pearl White - Elaine Dodge* Creighton Hale - Walter Jameson...
(1915) (uncredited) - The New Adventures of J. Rufus WallingfordThe New Adventures of J. Rufus Wallingford-Cast:* Burr McIntosh - J. Rufus 'Jim Wallingford* Max Figman - Blackie Daw* Lolita Robertson - Violet Warden* Frances White - Fanny Warden* Edward O'Connor - Onion Jones* Harry Mainhall - Benzy Falls Jr.* Allan Murnane - Andre Perigourd...
(1915) (uncredited) - The WarningThe WarningThe Warning is the first full-length album by Queensrÿche, released on 7 September 1984 .The original tracklisting for the album was changed by mix engineer Val Garay under orders from EMI America against the wishes of the band...
(1914) (uncredited) - Policeman