Louis Wolheim

Louis Wolheim (March 28, 1880 - February 18, 1931) was an American character actor.

His trademark broken nose was the result of an injury sustained while playing football for Cornell University. Despite his rugged visage, Wolheim was intelligent and cultivated, speaking French, German, Spanish, and Yiddish. He was also a mathematics teacher before entering silent films in 1914. On the advice of Lionel Barrymore, Wolheim entered films. He appeared in at least two films with Lionel's brother, John Barrymore, Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde (1920) and Tempest (1928). Wolheim's visage almost immediately typecast him in roles as gangsters, executioners (as in D. W. Griffith's Orphans of the Storm) or prisoners. Towards the end of the 1920s he occasionally broke out of these stereotypes and played a comic Russian officer in Tempest and a rambunctious Sergeant in Howard Hughes's Two Arabian Knights.

Wolheim acted primarily in silent films, due to the fact that he died at the close of the silent era, but he also appeared in the talkies All Quiet on the Western Front and Danger Lights (both 1930) before he died.

Later in his career, about 1924, Wolheim went into the theater. He received considerable acclaim as Yank in the original stage production of The Hairy Ape (1922) by Eugene O'Neill.

According to the biography included in the DVD version of All Quiet on the Western Front, Wolheim wanted, at one point in his career, to play romantic leads instead of tough "heavies." To that end, he sought to have plastic surgery performed on his broken nose. Executives at United Artists successfully obtained a restraining order against him from doing so, however.

Wolheim died in 1931 in Los Angeles, of stomach cancer.

Filmography

• The Sin Ship (1931) - Captain Sam McVey
• Gentleman's Fate (1931) - Frank
• The Silver Horde (1930) - George Balt
• Danger Lights (1930) - Dan Thorn
• All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) - Stanislaus Katczinsky
• The Ship from Shanghai (1930) - Ted, the steward
• Condemned (1929) - Jacques
• Frozen Justice (1929) - Duke
• The Wolf Song (1929) - Gullion
• Square Shoulders (1929) - Slag Collins
• The Shady Lady (1928) - Professor Holbrook
• The Awakening (1928) - Le Bete
• The Racket (1928) - Nick Scarsi
• Tempest (1928) - Sgt. Bulba
• Sorrell and Son (1927) - Buck
• Two Arabian Knights (1927) - Sergeant Peter McGaffney
• Lover's Island (1925) - Captain Joshua Dawson
• The Story Without a Name (1924) - Kurder
• America (1924) - Capt. Hare
• The Uninvited Guest (1924) - Jan Boomer
• Unseeing Eyes (1923) - Laird
• Little Old New York (1923) - The Hoboken Terror
• The Go-Getter (1923) - Daniel Silver
• Enemies of Women (1923) (scenes deleted)
• Love's Old Sweet Song (1923) - The Wanderer
• The Last Moment (1923) - The Finn
• The Face in the Fog (1922) - Petrus
• Sherlock Holmes (1922) - Craigin
• Determination (1922)
• Orphans of the Storm (1921) - Executioner
• Experience (1921) - Crime
• A Manhattan Knight (1920) - Mangus O'Shea
• Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920) (uncredited) - Music Hall Proprietor
• Number 17 (1920)
• The Darkest Hour (1919) - Louis Marcotte
• The Carter Case (1919) - Emanon
• The Poor Rich Man (1918) - Wrestler
• A Pair of Cupids (1918) aka. Both Members (reissue title) - Dirk Thomas
• Opportunity (1918) (uncredited) - A prizefight spectator
• Peg of the Pirates (1918) - Flatnose Tim
• The House of Hate (1918)
• The Eyes of Mystery (1918) - Brad Tilton
• The Avenging Trail (1917) - Lefty Reed
• The Eternal Mother (1917) - Bucky McGhee
• The Belle of the Season (1917) - Johnson
• The Millionaire's Double (1917) - Bob Holloway
• The End of the Tour (1917)
• The Sunbeam (1916) - Biff the Brute
• The Brand of Cowardice (1916) - Cpl. Mallin
• Dorian's Divorce (1916) - Capt. Ross
• The Romance of Elaine (1915) (uncredited)
• The New Adventures of J. Rufus Wallingford (1915) (uncredited)
• The Warning (1914) (uncredited) - Policeman

External links

• Louis Wolheim at the Internet Movie Database