Irving Pichel (June 24, 1891 â€" July 13, 1954) was an American actor
and film director, who won acclaim both as an actor and director in
his Hollywood career.Pichel was born to a Jewish family in Pittsburgh.
He attended Pittsburgh Central High School with George S. Kaufman. The
two collaborated on a play, The Failure. Pichel graduated from Harvard
University in 1914 and went immediately into the theater. Pichel's
first work in musical theatre was as a technical director for the
theater of the San Francisco Bohemian Club; he also helped with the
annual summer pageant, held at the elite Bohemian Grove, in which up
to 300 of its wealthy, influential members from finance and government
participate. With this expertise, he was also hired by Wallace Rice as
the main narrator in Rice's ambitious pageant play, Primavera, the
Masque of Santa Barbara in 1920. He founded the Berkeley Playhouse in
1923 and served as its director until 1926.Pichel moved to Los Angeles
where he studied acting at the Pasadena Playhouse. It was there that
Pichel achieved considerable acclaim as the title character in the
landmark Pasadena Playhouse production of Eugene O'Neill's play
Lazarus Laughed in 1927. Two years later, when the studios were hiring
any theater-trained actors suitable for talkies, he was signed to a
contract with Paramount.Pichel worked steadily as a character actor
throughout the 1930s, including the early version of the Theodore
Dreiser novel, An American Tragedy (1931), Madame Butterfly (1932), in
a low budget version of Oliver Twist (1933) as Fagin, in Cleopatra
(1934), alongside Leslie Howard in Michael Curtiz's British Agent
(1934), as the servant Sandor in Dracula’s Daughter (1936), in the
Bette Davis film Jezebel (1938), as the proprietor of a seedy
roadhouse in the once scandalous The Story of Temple Drake (1933) and
as a Mexican general in Juarez (1939).
and film director, who won acclaim both as an actor and director in
his Hollywood career.Pichel was born to a Jewish family in Pittsburgh.
He attended Pittsburgh Central High School with George S. Kaufman. The
two collaborated on a play, The Failure. Pichel graduated from Harvard
University in 1914 and went immediately into the theater. Pichel's
first work in musical theatre was as a technical director for the
theater of the San Francisco Bohemian Club; he also helped with the
annual summer pageant, held at the elite Bohemian Grove, in which up
to 300 of its wealthy, influential members from finance and government
participate. With this expertise, he was also hired by Wallace Rice as
the main narrator in Rice's ambitious pageant play, Primavera, the
Masque of Santa Barbara in 1920. He founded the Berkeley Playhouse in
1923 and served as its director until 1926.Pichel moved to Los Angeles
where he studied acting at the Pasadena Playhouse. It was there that
Pichel achieved considerable acclaim as the title character in the
landmark Pasadena Playhouse production of Eugene O'Neill's play
Lazarus Laughed in 1927. Two years later, when the studios were hiring
any theater-trained actors suitable for talkies, he was signed to a
contract with Paramount.Pichel worked steadily as a character actor
throughout the 1930s, including the early version of the Theodore
Dreiser novel, An American Tragedy (1931), Madame Butterfly (1932), in
a low budget version of Oliver Twist (1933) as Fagin, in Cleopatra
(1934), alongside Leslie Howard in Michael Curtiz's British Agent
(1934), as the servant Sandor in Dracula’s Daughter (1936), in the
Bette Davis film Jezebel (1938), as the proprietor of a seedy
roadhouse in the once scandalous The Story of Temple Drake (1933) and
as a Mexican general in Juarez (1939).
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