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Percy Kilbride

 
Actor: Percy Kilbride
Home > Library > Entertainment & Arts > Actors
  • Born: Jul 16, 1888 in San Francisco, California
  • Died: Dec 11, 1964 in Hollywood, California
  • Occupation: Actor
  • Active: '40s-'50s
  • Major Genres: Comedy, Drama
  • Career Highlights: George Washington Slept Here, The Southerner, The Egg and I
  • First Major Screen Credit: White Woman (1933)

Biography

Familiar to million as the twangy, bucolic Pa Kettle, Percy Kilbride first stepped on the stage in the role of an 18th-century French fop in a San Francisco production of Tale of Two Cities. Interrupting his career to serve in World War I, Kilbride spent the postwar years in regional stock companies. He made a few scattered movie appearances in the 1930s, then returned to Hollywood to stay in 1942, when he re-created his Broadway role in the film version of George Washington Slept Here. Kilbride played a variety of rustic parts until 1947, when he created the Pa Kettle role in The Egg and I. From 1949 through 1955, he starred exclusively in Universal's Ma and Pa Kettle series, retiring from the screen after Ma and Pa Kettle at Waikiki (1955) (Kilbride's co-star Marjorie Main appeared in two more Kettle films opposite Arthur Hunnicutt and Parker Fennelly). In 1964, Percy Kilbride and his actor friend Ralf Belmont were crossing a Los Angeles street near Kilbride's home when a car struck both of them down; Belmont was killed instantly, but Kilbride survived long enough to undergo brain surgery. He died of his injuries after a long hospital stay. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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Wikipedia: Percy Kilbride
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Percy Kilbride

from the trailer for George Washington Slept Here (1942)
Born July 16, 1888(1888-07-16)
San Francisco, California, United States
Died December 11, 1964 (aged 76)
Los Angeles, California, United States

Percy W. Kilbride (July 16, 1888 – December 11, 1964) was an American character actor.

The son of Irish immigrants, and despite being raised in a big city, he made a career of playing country hicks, most memorably as lazy Pa Kettle in the Ma and Pa Kettle movie series.

Kilbride began working in theater at the age of 12 and eventually left his young son and young daughter to become an actor on Broadway. He first played an 18th-century French dandy in A Tale of Two Cities.

His film debut was as Jakey in White Woman in 1933. He left Broadway for good in 1942.

In 1945 he appeared in The Southerner.

In 1947, he and Marjorie Main played the supporting parts of Ma and Pa Kettle in The Egg and I, starring Fred MacMurray and Claudette Colbert. Those were followed by the popular Ma and Pa Kettle series with Kilbride and Main playing the main characters, during which time he also played in other movies.

Kilbride retired after making the 1955 film Ma and Pa Kettle at Waikiki due to an automobile accident.[1]

Death

Percy Kilbride died days after he and his friend were struck by a car while walking near his home, at the corner of Yucca and Cherokee Streets, in his Hollywood neighborhood. Kilbride's friend and acting colleague Ralf Belmont, died instantly. Kilbride died later from head injuries. He was 76. He was buried near his hometown of San Francisco, at Golden Gate Nation Veteran's Cemetery, in San Bruno, CA.

Kilbride left his estate to the four nephews and a sister of his wife.

References

  1. ^ Fitzgerald, Michael G. (1977), Universal Pictures: A Panoramic History in Words, Pictures, and Filmographies, New Rochelle, New York: Arlington House Publishers, p. 69, ISBN 0-87000-366-6 

External links

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