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Lionel Atwill

 
American Theater Guide: Lionel Atwill
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Atwill, Lionel (1885–1946), actor. After a long career in his native England, he came to America in 1915 to tour with Lillie Langtry, staying to produce and star in the mystery play The Lodger (1917). Several quick failures followed before he won attention in 1918 playing the leading male roles opposite Alla Nazimova in Arthur Hopkins's revivals of The Wild Duck, Hedda Gabler, and A Doll's House. He also shone as the politician Clive Cooper in Tiger! Tiger! (1918), the sadly beset pantomimist Deburau (1920), the bittersweet title roles in The Grand Duke (1921) and The Comedian (1923), and the put‐upon inventor Anton Rogatsky in The Outsider (1924). In a change of pace the following year Atwill played Caesar opposite the Cleopatra of Helen Hayes. Thereafter he appeared mostly in failures until he left to spend his last years in films. Atwill was a fine character actor with a curiously quizzical, doleful face and an elegant playing style.

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Actor: Lionel Atwill
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  • Born: Mar 01, 1885 in Croydon, England
  • Died: Nov 20, 1946 in Santa Monica, Los Angeles, California
  • Occupation: Actor
  • Active: '30s-'40s
  • Major Genres: Drama, Horror
  • Career Highlights: To Be or Not to Be, Three Comrades, The Mystery of the Wax Museum
  • First Major Screen Credit: Doctor X (1932)

Biography

British actor Lionel Atwill was born into wealth and educated at London's prestigious Mercer School, where he planned to pursue a career as an architect; instead, he became a stage actor, working steadily from his debut at age 20, most often in the plays of Ibsen and Shaw. Establishing himself in America, Atwill continued his stage work, supplementing his income with silent film appearances, the first being Eve's Daughter(1918). Atwill's rich rolling voice made him a natural for talking pictures. Following a pair of Vitaphone short subjects in 1928, the actor made his talkie bow in The Verdict (1932). Most effective in roles as an aristocratic villain, Atwill found himself appearing in numerous melodramas and horror films, including the classic Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933). Atwill's career was threatened in 1940, when it was revealed that he'd thrown an "orgy" at his home, complete with naked guests and pornographic films. Atwill "lied like a gentleman" to protect his party guests at the subsequent trial, and was convicted of perjury. The ensuing scandal made Atwill virtually unemployable at most studios, but he found a semi-permanent home at Universal Pictures, which at the time was grinding out low budget horror films. Lionel Atwill died in harness in the middle of production of the 1946 Universal serial Lost City of the Jungle; viewers watching this serial today will no doubt notice how often Atwill's character turns his back to the camera, allowing the producers to cover his absence with a stand-in. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Wikipedia: Lionel Atwill
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Lionel Atwill

with his second wife Elsie Mackay in 1922, in a Vanity Fair publicity photo for The White-Faced Fool
Born 1 March 1885(1885-03-01)
Croydon, London, England, UK
Died 22 April 1946 (aged 61)
Pacific Palisades, California, U.S.
Occupation Actor
Years active 1905–1946

Lionel Atwill (1 March 1885 – 22 April 1946) was an English stage and film actor born in Croydon, London, England.

He began his stage career in 1905 in England, and had become a star in Broadway theatre by 1918,[1] but was most famous for his horror roles in the 1930s. His two most memorable parts were as the crazed, disfigured sculptor in Mystery of the Wax Museum (Warner Brothers, 1933), and as Inspector Krogh in Son of Frankenstein (1939), memorably sent up by Kenneth Mars in Mel Brooks's Young Frankenstein (1974).

When he was not cast in macabre roles, Atwill often appeared in the 1930s as righteous-minded authority figures. For example, in 1937's less memorable The Wrong Road for RKO, investigator Atwill persuades a young, bank-robbing ingenue played by Helen Mack and her boyfriend Richard Cromwell to return their ill-gotten $100,000 and give up a life of crime. Two of Atwill's other notable non-horror roles were opposite his contemporary Basil Rathbone in film adaptations of Arthur Conan Doyle's character Sherlock Holmes, including a role as Dr. James Mortimer in 20th Century Fox's 1939 film rendition of the Conan Doyle novel The Hound of the Baskervilles, and the 1942 Universal Studios film Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon, in which he played Holmes' archenemy and super-villain, Professor Moriarty.[2]

Atwill remained a stalwart of the Universal horror films until his career flagged in the 1940s because of a widely publicized sex scandal in 1941, during the investigation of which he was charged in 1942 with perjury at a rape trial.[3] The Hays Office had him blacklisted,[citation needed] and he later returned to the theatre.

He died while working on the 1946 film serial Lost City of the Jungle. His ashes were once inurned in Chapel of the Pines Crematory.

Contents

Private life

He married four times:

  • Phyllis Ralph in 1913. In 1941 their son, John Arthur Atwill, was killed in action aged 26.[4]
  • American actress Elsie Mackay in 1919 (with whom one source claims he had a son, John[5]). In 1925 Atwill had detectives raid an apartment on Manhattan's 68th Street, where Mackay was found with actor Max Montesole. A divorce was finally granted in March 1928.[6][7]
  • Louise Cromwell Brooks in 1930, who had previously been married to Douglas MacArthur.
  • Mary Paula Shilstone in 1944[8] who carried his only living child, Lionel Anthony Atwill. His son Tony is a retired writer.

Partial filmography

References

  1. ^ "The Rise of Lionel Atwill", The New York Times, April 14, 1918, p. X6.
  2. ^ Official Lionel Atwill - Web Site & Fan Club
  3. ^ "Lionel Atwill Indicted", The New York Times, July 1, 1942, p. 28.
  4. ^ "Actor Lionel Atwill's Son Killed in British Air Action". Chicago Tribune. 29/04/1941.  Commonwealth War Graves Commission - CWGC record.
  5. ^ Doug Macauley, Great Character Actors - Lionel Atwill
  6. ^ Barry Brown, of The Horrors - Profile of Lionel Atwill
  7. ^ There were two actresses by the name of Elsie Mackay in the 1920s, but the English actress and aviator was known on stage (London and Broadway) and film as Poppy Wyndham. Poppy Wyndham at 'Find a Grave' Many sources conflate the careers of these two actresses, but IMDB makes clear the distinction as Atwill's (ex)wife Elsie Mackay was still performing in 1935, whilst 'Poppy Wyndham' died in an air accident in 1928. IMDB - Disambiguation page for Elsie Mackay
  8. ^ Official Lionel Atwill - Web Site & Fan Club

External links


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American Theater Guide. The Oxford Companion to American Theatre. Copyright © 2004 by Oxford University Press, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
Actor. Copyright © 2009 All Media Guide, LLC. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Lionel Atwill".  Read more