Eugene Pallette

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Eugene Pallette (July 8, 1889 – September 3, 1954) was an American actor who appeared in over 240 films.

Biography

Career

Born in Winfield, Kansas, Pallette became a silent screen actor beginning in 1912. He quickly advanced to featured status, appearing in many westerns. He worked with D.W. Griffith on such famous films as The Birth of a Nation (1915) and Intolerance (1916). At this time, he had a slim, athletic figure, a far cry from the portly build that would gain him fame later in his career.

After gaining a substantial amount of weight, Pallette's status as a recognizable character actor rose. In 1927, Pallette signed as a regular for Hal Roach Studios, and was a reliable comic foil in several early Laurel and Hardy films before the advent of talkies. In later years, Pallette's weight may have topped out at 300 pounds.

Sound proved to be the second major career boost for Pallette. His inimitable rasping gravel voice (described as "half an octave below anyone else in the cast") made him one of Hollywood's most sought-after character actors in the 1930s and 1940s.

The typical Pallette role was the comically exasperated head of the family (as in My Man Godfrey and The Lady Eve), the cynical backroom sharpy (as in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington), or the gruff detective. However, Pallette's best known role may be as Friar Tuck in The Adventures of Robin Hood.

BBC commentator Dana Gioia gave this extensive description of Pallette's onscreen appeal:

"Pallette could anchor a scene just by walking downstairs. When he enters Preston Sturges's The Lady Eve (1941), trotting down to breakfast singing a merry ballad, he embodies all the small human hopes that screwball comedy exists to shatter.... The mature Pallette character is a creature of provocative contradictions—tough-minded but indulgent, earthy but epicurean, relaxed but excitable. His grit and gravel voice sounds simultaneously tough and comic. Even his corpulence is two-sided. In his best films Pallette made his fatness seem like a sign of moderation and common sense. As Friar Tuck in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) or Fray Felipe in The Mark of Zorro (1940), he shows that a fat priest is no heartless zealot but understands the sins of the flesh. Playing a tubby millionaire like the beer baron in The Lady Eve or Alexander Bullock in My Man Godfrey (1936), Pallette uses his girth to create a common touch. Stuffed into a tuxedo that seems perpetually near bursting, he seems more down-to-earth than the stylish high society types who surround him. Even Pallette's villains, like the corrupt and cynical politico Chick McCann in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, are immensely likeable. Pushed too far, Pallette confidently uses his weight for physical force. When Bullock finally evicts the free-loading Carlo (Mischa Auer) in My Man Godfrey, we are not so much surprised as reassured by Pallette's manly strength. In battle his sword-wielding Friar Tuck is a glory to behold. Pallette may have gained weight, but he never lost his underlying virility."

In increasingly ill health by his late fifties, Pallette made fewer and fewer movies, and for lesser studios. His final film, Suspense, was released in 1946. He died in Los Angeles from cancer. He is interred at Green Lawn Cemetery in Grenola, Kansas with an unmarked grave.

Selected filmography

• The Birth of a Nation (1915) with Lillian Gish and Raoul Walsh
• The Highbinders (1915)
• The Story of a Story (1915)
• The Spell of the Poppy (1915)
• Intolerance (1916) with Lillian Gish and Constance Talmadge
• Tarzan of the Apes (1918) with Elmo Lincoln and Gordon Griffith
• The Three Musketeers (1921) with Douglas Fairbanks
• The Ten Commandments (1923) with Richard Dix
• North of Hudson Bay (1923) with Tom Mix
• The Wolf Man (1924) with John Gilbert and Norma Shearer
• Stupid, But Brave (1924), directed by Fatty Arbuckle
• Mantrap (1926) with Clara Bow and Ford Sterling
• Should Men Walk Home? (1927) with Mabel Normand and Oliver Hardy
• Fluttering Hearts (1927) with Charley Chase and Oliver Hardy
• Sugar Daddies (1927) with Laurel and Hardy
• The Second Hundred Years (1927) with Laurel and Hardy
• The Battle of the Century (1927) with Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy
• Lights of New York (1928)
• The Canary Murder Case (1929)
• The Virginian (1929) with Gary Cooper and Walter Huston
• The Love Parade (1929) with Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald
• Follow Thru (1930) with Charles 'Buddy' Rogers and Nancy Carroll
• Paramount on Parade (1930) all-star revue released by Paramount Pictures
• Fighting Caravans (1931) with Gary Cooper and Lili Damita
• The Stolen Jools aka The Slippery Pearls (1931) with an all-star cast
• Girls About Town (1931)
• Shanghai Express (1932) with Marlene Dietrich and Anna May Wong
• Dancers in the Dark (1932) with Miriam Hopkins and George Raft
• Wild Girl (1932) with Charles Farrell, Joan Bennett, and Ralph Bellamy
• Hell Below (1933) with Robert Montgomery, Walter Huston, and Jimmy Durante
• The Kennel Murder Case (1933) with William Powell and Mary Astor
• I've Got Your Number (1934)
• Caravan (1934) with Charles Boyer and Loretta Young
• Bordertown (1935) with Paul Muni and Bette Davis
• The Ghost Goes West (1935) with Robert Donat
• Steamboat Round the Bend (1935) with Will Rogers
• The Golden Arrow (1936) with Bette Davis and George Brent
• My Man Godfrey (1936) with William Powell and Carole Lombard
• Stowaway (1936) with Shirley Temple and Robert Young
• Topper (1937) with Constance Bennett and Cary Grant
• One Hundred Men and a Girl (1937) with Deanna Durbin and Adolphe Menjou
• The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) with Errol Flynn and Basil Rathbone
• Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) with James Stewart and Jean Arthur
• Young Tom Edison (1940) with Mickey Rooney
• The Mark of Zorro (1940) with Tyrone Power and Basil Rathbone
• The Lady Eve (1941) with Henry Fonda and Barbara Stanwyck
• The Bride Came C.O.D. (1941) with James Cagney and Bette Davis
• The Big Street (1942) with Lucille Ball
• The Male Animal (1942) with Henry Fonda and Olivia de Havilland
• Tales of Manhattan (1942) with an all-star cast
• The Forest Rangers (1942)
• Slightly Dangerous (1943) with Lana Turner and Robert Young
• Heaven Can Wait (1943) with Gene Tierney and Don Ameche
• The Gang's All Here (1943) with Alice Faye and Carmen Miranda
• In the Meantime, Darling (1944)
• Pin Up Girl (1944) with Betty Grable, Martha Raye and Joe E. Brown
• Step Lively (1944) with Frank Sinatra
• The Cheaters (1945) with Billie Burke

External links

• Eugene Pallette at IMDb
• Obituary

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