Billy Barty, a 3'10" actor whose career spanned seven decades and all types of roles, began his acting career early on. By age three, he was already starring in a 1927 Hollywood feature.
In 1957, Barty founded Little People of America, an advocacy group for others with dwarfism. He later created a non-profit foundation to help improve the quality of life for dwarfs, or little people, as he preferred to call them. The official name of the syndrome is called Cartilage Hair Syndrome Hypoplasia.
In October 2000, Barty was awarded the Long Beach Film Festival's Humanitarian of the Year Award. He also was active in George W. Bush's presidential campaign and he served on a disabilities commission for Jack Kemp when Kemp was secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Barty died December 23, 2000, at the age of 76.
Career Highlights: Rumpelstiltskin, Under the Rainbow, Being Different
First Major Screen Credit: Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Biography
American dwarf actor Billy Barty always claimed to have been born in the early '20s, but the evidence of his somewhat wizened, all-knowing countenance in his film appearances of the 1930s would suggest that he was at least ten years shy of the whole truth. At any rate, Barty made many film appearances from at least 1931 onward, most often cast as bratty children due to his height. He was a peripheral member of an Our Gang rip-off in the Mickey McGuire comedy shorts, portrayed the infant-turned-pig in Alice in Wonderland (1933), he did a turn in blackface as a "shrunken" Eddie Cantor in Roman Scandals (also 1933), and he frequently popped up as a lasciviously leering baby in the risqué musical highlights of Busby Berkeley's Warner Bros. films. One of Barty's most celebrated cinema moments occurred in 1937's Nothing Sacred, in which, playing a small boy, he pops up out of nowhere to bite Fredric March in the leg. Barty was busy but virtually anonymous in films, since he seldom received screen credit. TV audiences began to connect his name with his face in the 1950s when Barty was featured on various variety series hosted by bandleader Spike Jones. Disdainful of certain professional "little people" who rely on size alone to get laughs, Barty was seen at his very best on the Jones programs, dancing, singing, and delivering dead-on impressions: the diminutive actor's takeoff on Liberace was almost unbearably funny. Though he was willing to poke fun at himself on camera, Barty was fiercely opposed to TV and film producers who exploited midgets and dwarves, and as he continued his career into the 1970s and '80s, Barty saw to it that his own roles were devoid of patronization -- in fact, he often secured parts that could have been portrayed by so-called "normal" actors, proof that one's stature has little to do with one's talent. A two-fisted advocate of equitable treatment of short actors, Billy Barty took time away from his many roles in movies (Foul Play [1978], Willow [1988]) and TV to maintain his support organization The Little People of America and the Billy Barty Foundation. Billy Barty died in December 2000 of heart failure. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Billy Barty (October 25, 1924 – December 23, 2000), born William John Bertanzetti, was an American filmactor, and one of the most famous 20th century people with dwarfism.
Barty, an Italian American, was born in Millsboro, Pennsylvania. He was a member of the gang in the Mickey McGuire serial of silent shorts (a children's comedy series of the 1920s, similar in tone to the "Our Gang"/"Little Rascals" comedies, starring a very young Mickey Rooney in the title role). In The Gold Diggers of 1933, a nine-year-old Barty appeared as a baby who escapes from his stroller. Because of his stature, much of his work consisted of bit parts and gag roles, although he was featured prominently in W.C. Fields and Me (1976), Foul Play and The Lord of the Rings (both 1978), Under the Rainbow (1981), Night Patrol (1984), Legend (1985), Masters of the Universe (1987), Willow (1988), UHF (1989), Life Stinks and Radioland Murders (1994). Barty was known for his boundless energy and enthusiasm for any productions in which he appeared. He also performed a remarkable impression of pianist Liberace. He performed with the Spike Jones musical comedy show on stage and television. He was also the evil side kick on the 1970s Saturday morning TV series Dr. Shrinker.
Barty also starred in a local Southern California children's show, "Billy Barty's Bigtop," in the mid-1960s, which regularly showed The Three Stooges shorts. In one program, Stooge Moe Howard visited the set as a surprise guest. The program gave many Los Angeles-area children their first opportunity to become familiar with little people, who until then had been rarely glimpsed on the screen except as two-dimensional curiousities.
Barty also starred as "Sigmund" in the popular children's t.v. show "Sigmund and the Sea Monsters" produced by Sid and Marty Krofft in 1974-1976. In 1983, Barty supplied the voice for Figment in EPCOT Center's Journey Into Imagination dark ride. He subsequently supplied a reprisal for the second incarnation, though very brief.
Barty was a noted activist for the promotion of rights for others with dwarfism. He was disappointed with contemporary Hervé Villechaize's insistence that they were "midgets" instead of actors with dwarfism. Barty founded the Little People of America to help with his activism.
Barty was married to Shirley Bolingbroke of Malad City, Idaho, from 1962 until his death at age 76. They had two children, Lori Neilson and TV/film producer and director Braden Barty.
A tribute book on his life was published in December 2002. Within Reach: An Inspirational Journey into the Life, Legacy and Influence of Billy Barty was produced by Barty's nephew, Michael Copeland, and Michael's wife, Debra.
Until the time of his death, Barty was a beloved annual guest-star on Canada's Telemiracle telethon, one of the most successful (per capita) telethons in the world. He was entombed in Glendale's Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery.
Copeland, Michael and Debra (2002). Within Reach: An Inspirational Journey into the Life, Legacy and Influence of Billy Barty. Xulon Press. ISBN1-59160-391-9.
