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Nat Pendleton

 
Actor: Nat Pendleton
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  • Born: Aug 09, 1895 in Davenport, Iowa
  • Died: Oct 12, 1967 in California
  • Occupation: Actor
  • Active: '30s-'40s
  • Major Genres: Drama, Comedy
  • Career Highlights: The Thin Man, Calling Dr. Kildare, Deception
  • First Major Screen Credit: Let's Get Married (1926)

Biography

Born in Iowa, Nat Pendleton was raised in New York, where he attended Columbia University. A champion wrestler in his college days, Pendleton joined the U.S. Olympic team in 1920, winning a silver medal for his grappling talents. He turned professional, becoming World's Champion in 1924. Around this time, Pendleton was hired to play a wrestler (what a stretch) in the Broadway play Naughty Cinderella. He decided to switch to acting full-time, heading to Hollywood in 1927. Some of his earlier film roles required him to merely look tough and flex his muscles while the stars around him made funny; as football player McHardie in the Marx Brothers' Horse Feathers (1932), Pendleton isn't even given a screen credit. He finally graduated to leading roles in 1933, playing a wrestler (what, again?) in Deception, for which he wrote the screenplay. Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, Pendleton was one of Hollywood's busiest and best-liked character actors -- still specializing in brawny roles, but at last permitted to get some of the laughs himself rather than simply stooging for others. For his second appearance in a Marx Brothers film, 1939's At the Circus, Pendleton, decked in a handlebar mustache and Harpo-like wig, was prominently billed as crooked strongman Goliath. His best-remembered film roles included thick-eared ambulance driver Joe Wayland in MGM's Dr. Kildare films and blustering cop-turned-drill sergeant Mike Collins in Abbott and Costello's two Buck Privates efforts. Thanks to careful investments, Pendleton was able to retire from filmmaking in 1947, at the age of 52. Nat Pendleton was the brother of another busy character actor, Gaylord (Steve) Pendleton. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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Wikipedia: Nat Pendleton
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Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Wikipedia
Nat Pendleton

as Eugen Sandow from the trailer for
The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
Born August 9, 1895
Davenport, Iowa
Died October 12, 1967, age 72
San Diego, California, USA
Years active 1913–1956
Spouse(s) Barbara Evelyn (?-1967) (his death)
Juanita Alfonzo (?-?)
Olympic medal record
Men's freestyle wrestling
Silver 1920 Antwerp heavyweight

Nathaniel Greene Pendleton (9 August 1895 – 12 October 1967) was an American Olympic wrestler and film actor.

Contents

Biography

Early life

Pendleton was born in Davenport, Iowa to Adelaide E. and Nathaniel G. Pendleton. He studied at Columbia University where he began his wrestling career. He was twice Eastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association (EIWA) champion in 1914 and 1915. Chosen to compete in the US wrestling team at the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp, Belgium, Pendleton lost only one match during the competition, and was awarded a silver medal. Returning to the US he became a professional wrestler, and with the celebrity status he had achieved, drifted into movies in the late 1920s.

Movie career

His early roles were largely uncredited. Then he was chosen to appear in Horse Feathers (1932) with the Marx Brothers as one of the two football players who kidnap Harpo and Chico, and his career began to develop. His role as circus strongman Eugen Sandow in The Great Ziegfeld (1936) brought him the strongest reviews of his career. Pendleton was most often cast in supporting roles as thugs, gangsters, or policemen and was usually typecast playing characters that depended on their brawn but were "none too bright".

Some of his other films include Manhattan Melodrama (1934), The Thin Man (1934), The Shopworn Angel (1938), Another Thin Man (1939), At the Circus (1939) again with the Marx Brothers, and Northwest Passage (1940). He appeared in recurring roles in two MGM film series of the late 1930s and 1940's -- as Joe Wayman, the ambulance driver in the Dr. Kildare series, and its spin-off, the Dr. Gillespie series. He made his final film appearances in Scared to Death with Bela Lugosi, and Buck Privates Come Home (both 1947).

Pendleton died in San Diego, California in 1967 from a heart attack.

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Actor. Copyright © 2009 All Media Guide, LLC. All rights reserved.  Read more
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