Max Wagner (November 28, 1901 â€" November 16, 1975) was a
Mexican-born American film actor who specialized in playing small
parts such as thugs, gangsters, sailors, henchmen, bodyguards, cab
drivers and moving men, appearing more than 400 films in his career,
most without receiving screen credit. In 1927, he was a leading
witness in the well-publicized manslaughter trials of actor Paul Kelly
and actress/screenwriter Dorothy Mackaye.Wagner was one of five
children, all boys, of William Wallace Wagner, a railroad conductor,
and Edith Wagner, a writer who provided dispatches for the Christian
Science Monitor during the Mexican Revolution. When he was 10 years
old, his father was killed by rebels and the family moved to Salinas,
California, where he met John Steinbeck, who became a lifelong friend.
Steinbeck based the character of the boy in his novel The Red Pony on
Wagner.Three of Wagner's brothers were working in Hollywood â€" Jack
Wagner and Blake Wagner as cameramen for D.W. Griffith, Hal Roach and
Mack Sennett, and Bob as an assistant cameraman at First National â€"
and Max Wagner moved there in 1924, where he got an acting job on the
Harry Langdon film his brother Jack was working on, All Night
Long.Under the name "Max Baron", Wagner acted in many Spanish-language
versions of English-language films, which studios made as a matter of
course in the early days of sound films, He also served as a Spanish
language coach for other actors, and appeared in many of the "Mexican
Spitfire" films starring Lupe Vélez, where he also served to monitor
Velez's Spanish ad-libs for profanity.
Mexican-born American film actor who specialized in playing small
parts such as thugs, gangsters, sailors, henchmen, bodyguards, cab
drivers and moving men, appearing more than 400 films in his career,
most without receiving screen credit. In 1927, he was a leading
witness in the well-publicized manslaughter trials of actor Paul Kelly
and actress/screenwriter Dorothy Mackaye.Wagner was one of five
children, all boys, of William Wallace Wagner, a railroad conductor,
and Edith Wagner, a writer who provided dispatches for the Christian
Science Monitor during the Mexican Revolution. When he was 10 years
old, his father was killed by rebels and the family moved to Salinas,
California, where he met John Steinbeck, who became a lifelong friend.
Steinbeck based the character of the boy in his novel The Red Pony on
Wagner.Three of Wagner's brothers were working in Hollywood â€" Jack
Wagner and Blake Wagner as cameramen for D.W. Griffith, Hal Roach and
Mack Sennett, and Bob as an assistant cameraman at First National â€"
and Max Wagner moved there in 1924, where he got an acting job on the
Harry Langdon film his brother Jack was working on, All Night
Long.Under the name "Max Baron", Wagner acted in many Spanish-language
versions of English-language films, which studios made as a matter of
course in the early days of sound films, He also served as a Spanish
language coach for other actors, and appeared in many of the "Mexican
Spitfire" films starring Lupe Vélez, where he also served to monitor
Velez's Spanish ad-libs for profanity.
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