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Irving Pichel

 
Director: Irving Pichel
Home > Library > Entertainment & Arts > Actors
  • Born: Jun 25, 1891 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
  • Died: Jul 13, 1954 in Hollywood, California
  • Occupation: Director, Actor
  • Active: '30s-'40s
  • Major Genres: Drama, Crime
  • Career Highlights: The Most Dangerous Game, The Pied Piper, She
  • First Major Screen Credit: The Right to Love (1930)

Biography

Irving Pichel had wanted to be in the theater from childhood; one of his early buddies was future playwright George S. Kaufman. Pichel attended Harvard University and tried other lines of work, before acting finally won out. His pronounced Semitic features prevented Pichel from becoming a movie leading man in the white-bread 1930s, but he proved a valuable character player and villain in such Paramount films as Murder by the Clock (1931), An American Tragedy (1931), and The Cheat (1932). His deep, kindly voice tended to bely his bad guy characters, so Pichel had to become as proficient at vocal tricks as he was at character makeup. He was slated to star in the 1931 version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931), but director Rouben Mamoulien, complaining that Pichel would have been "Mr. Hyde and Mr. Hyde," chose Fredric March instead. Reviews were mixed on Pichel's subsequent portrayal of Fagin in the 1933 filmization of Oliver Twist, one critic bestowing upon him the "worst actor of the year" award (which he most certainly was not). Pichel began his directing career in collaboration with Ernst B. Schoedsack on The Most Dangerous Game (1932). His directorial efforts of the 1930s were largely potboilers, but the quality improved when he joined the Fox directing staff in the 1940s. His better efforts include Hudson's Bay (1940), The Pied Piper (1942), The Moon Is Down (1942), and, for Paramount, A Medal for Benny (1945). He also partnered with George Pal on the fanciful features The Great Rupert (1950) and Destination Moon (1950), and was producer of the 1941 Fox melodrama Swamp Water. By the mid-'40s, Pichel had all but abandoned film acting, though he played small parts in several of the films that he directed, performed on radio, and was the narrator of John Ford's She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949). Irving Pichel's last films as a director were those sectarian church-basement favorites Martin Luther (1953) and Day of Triumph (1954). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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Wikipedia: Irving Pichel
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Irving Pichel
Born 24 June 1891(1891-06-24)
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Died 13 July 1954 (aged 63)
Hollywood, California
Spouse(s) Violette Wilson

Irving Pichel (24 June, 1891 – 13 July, 1954), was an American actor, and film director. He married Violette Wilson, daughter of Jackson Stitt Wilson, a Methodist minister and Socialist mayor of Berkeley, California. Her sister was actress Viola Barry. The Pichels had three sons, Pichel Wilson, Julian Irving, and Marlowe Agnew.

Contents

Career

Pichel's first work in musical theatre was as a technical director for the Bohemian Club's summer pageants at the Bohemian Grove. He was soon loaned out to Wallace Rice as the main narrator in Rice's Primavera, the Masque of Santa Barbara in 1920.[1] Pichel achieved significant notoriety as the title character in the landmark Pasadena Playhouse production of Eugene O'Neill's play "Lazarus Laughed" in 1927.

Among his most notable screen roles were the servant Sandor in Dracula's Daughter, and Fagin in the 1933 adaptation of Oliver Twist. He directed several well-regarded films, including The Miracle of the Bells, Mr. Peabody and the Mermaid, and Destination Moon. His voice was heard as narrator in How Green Was My Valley.

By the mid 1940s, Pichel played small parts in several of the films that he directed, performed on radio, and was the narrator of John Ford's She Wore a Yellow Ribbon in 1949. His last films as a director were sectarian church-basement favorites Martin Luther in 1953, and Day of Triumph in 1954.

Blacklist

In 1947, Pichel was one of 19 members of the Hollywood community who were subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee during the United States' second Red Scare. This group became known as the "Hollywood Nineteen" and the "Unfriendly Nineteen".[2] While Pichel was ultimately not called to testify,[3] he was blacklisted, although he got around the blacklist by leaving the United States.[4]

Filmography

Actor

Director

Notes

  1. ^ Starr, Kevin. Material Dreams, Oxford University Press US, 1990, p. 276. ISBN 0195044878
  2. ^ McBride, p. 462
  3. ^ Pells, p. 302
  4. ^ Buhle, et al., p. 184

References

  • Buhle, Paul and Dave Wagner (2002). A Very Dangerous Citizen: Abraham Lincoln Polonsky and the Hollywood Left. University of California Press. ISBN 0520236726.
  • McBride, Joseph (2003). Searching for John Ford: A Life. Macmillan. ISBN 0312310110.
  • Pells, Richard H. (1989). The Liberal Mind in a Conservative Age: American Intellectuals in the 1940s and 1950s. Wesleyan University Press. ISBN 0819562254.

External links



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