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Vera Lewis

 
Actor: Vera Lewis
Home > Library > Entertainment & Arts > Actors
  • Born: Jan 10, 1873 in New York City, New York
  • Died: Feb 08, 1956 in Los Angeles, California
  • Occupation: Actor
  • Active: '20s-'40s
  • Major Genres: Drama, Comedy
  • Career Highlights: Ella Cinders, The Man on the Flying Trapeze, The Iron Mask
  • First Major Screen Credit: She Couldn't Help It (1921)

Biography

Affectionately described by film historian William K. Everson as "That lovable old wreck of a busybody," actress Vera Lewis was indeed quite lovable in person, even though most of her screen characters were sharp-tongued and spiteful in the extreme. Lewis first appeared in films in 1915, playing bits in such historical spectacles as D.W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation (1915) and Intolerance (1916) and the privately-funded Argonauts of California. By the 1920s, she was well-established in such venomous characterizations as the remonstrative stepmother in the 1926 Colleen Moore starrer Ella Cinders. She continued playing small-town snoops, gimlet-eyed landladies, irksome relatives and snobbish society doyennes well into the talkie era. Even when unbilled, Lewis was unforgettable: in 1933's King Kong, she's the outraged theater patron who mercilessly browbeats an usher upon finding out that the mighty Kong will be appearing in person instead of on film. When all is said and done, Vera Lewis was never better than when she was playing a gorgon-like mother-in-law, as witness her work as Mrs. Nesselrode in W.C. Fields' Man on the Flying Trapeze (1935) and as Andy Clyde's vituperative mom-by-marriage in the 1947 2-reeler Wife to Spare. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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Wikipedia: Vera Lewis
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Vera Lewis
Born 10 June 1873
New York, New York, USA
Died 8 February 1956
Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, USA
Years active 1915-1947

Vera Lewis (10 June 1873 – 8 February 1956), was an American film and stage actress, beginning in the silent film era. She appeared in 183 films between 1915 and 1947.

She was born in New York, New York, where she began acting in stage productions. Her film career started in 1915 with the film Hypocrites, which starred Myrtle Stedman and Courtenay Foote. From 1915 to 1929 she appeared in sixty three silent films, including the film classic Intolerance. Some sources have her also appearing in the 1915 film classic Birth of a Nation, however she did not.

Unlike many silent film stars, she made a smooth transition to "talking films", starting with her 1930 appearance in Wide Open, starring Patsy Ruth Miller and Edward Everett Horton. Though never what is referred to as a "premier star", she appeared in fifty eight films during the 1930s, and another sixty during the 1940s. She retired after 1947, and resided in Woodland Hills, California at the time of her death on February 8th, 1956.

Selected filmography

External links

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