Joseph Cawthorn
Acting
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Joseph Cawthorn (March 29, 1868, New York City, New York – January 21, 1949, Beverly Hills, California) was an American stage and film comic actor. Cawthorn started out in show business as a child, debuting at Robinson's Music Hall in his hometown of New York in 1872. He appeared in minstrel shows and vaudeville as a "Dutch" comic, employing a thick German dialect. He later worked in British music halls and American touring companies. Cawthorn made his Broadway debut in 1895, 1897 or 1898, and embarked on a long career lasting over two decades. His first success was playing Boris in Victor Herbert's 1898 operetta The Fortune Teller. Other notable Broadway roles included the title character in Mother Goose (1903) and inventor Dr. Pill in the fantasy musical Little Nemo (1908). In the latter, he was called upon to ad lib to buy time during one performance. As "the scene called for him to describe imaginary animals he had hunted", he invented the "whiffenpoof" on the spot. Yale students in the audience appropriated it for the name of their glee club. When his Broadway stardom waned, Cawthorn moved to Hollywood in 1927 and started a second prolific career, appearing in over 50 films, the last in 1942. He played Gremio in the first sound adaptation of The Taming of the Shrew in 1929, starring Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks; Schultz in Gold Diggers of 1935; and Florenz Ziegfeld's father in The Great Ziegfeld (1936). Cawthorn died peacefully on January 21, 1949. He was survived by his wife, actress Queenie Vassar.
Known For
Romance strikes when a vacationing millionairess and her daughter and son spend their vacation at a posh New England resort.
Gold Diggers of 1935
Medical intern Robert Morley is distraught after his wife dies in childbirth. He's resentful of his new son and wants nothing to do with him. He leaves the child with his aunt and uncle and heads off to Europe to pursue his medical studies. Morley returns to his hometown six years later, now a successful doctor and engaged to be married to a beautiful socialite. He also feels differently about the boy and attempts to gain custody from his aunt and uncle.
Broken Dreams
A wealthy landowner living in Haiti convinces a sorcerer to lure the woman he has fallen for away from her fiancé. The madman later betrays their agreement by keeping the woman for himself…as a zombie.
White Zombie
A Russian waiter in New York City becomes a national celebrity after he develops a "system" for winning at contract bridge.
Grand Slam
Alice Faye plays the title role in this 1940 film biography of the early-20th-century stage star.
Lillian Russell
Socialite Pat Reynolds (Ida Lupino) is forced to become the "smart girl" of the title when her wealthy father commits suicide, leaving nothing but a pile of debts. Pat sets up a successful hat-designing business, providing the sole support for herself and her sister Kay (Gail Patrick). So devoted is Pat to Kay's welfare that she stands by in stoic silence as Kay begins romancing Pat's sweetie Nick Graham (Kent Taylor).
Smart Girl
At the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, sideshow barker Florenz Ziegfeld turns the tables on his more-successful neighbor Billings, and also steals his girlfriend. This pattern repeats throughout their lives, as Ziegfeld makes and loses many fortunes putting on ever-bigger, more spectacular shows
The Great Ziegfeld
A young, innocent small-town church organist is thrown out of her home, told she was adopted, and that her mother was an evil woman. She follows a crush to the big city and is left fending for herself.
They Call It Sin
A Parisian tailor goes to a château to collect a bill, only to fall for an aloof young princess living there.
Love Me Tonight
Salesman develops a fake stock plan in new invention before it is finished.
Hot Money
Nan Reynolds encourages her copywriter husband Bill to open his own agency. Nearly out of business, he finally gets a client. Former girlfriend Patricia Berkeley writes a very successful commercial for the client and neats up their old romance. Wife and girlfriend struggle over Bill.
Housewife
A circus performer falls in love with the son of a plantation owner in antebellum New Orleans. When the young man's stepmother objects to the wedding, the couple break apart and go their separate ways for a time. Also in the mix are two circus comics who feud over the heart of another Southern belle.
Dixiana
An anti-Nazi refugee on the run and a young Jewish couple race across Europe trying to escape Hitler's ever powerful influence.
So Ends Our Night
Husband-and-wife vaudeville stars separate when success goes to his head.
Bright Lights
Ex-convicts try to stop a Chinese smuggling ring.
Lazy River
Unscrupulous agent Rush Blake makes singing waiter Buddy Clayton a big radio star while Peggy Cornell, who has lost her own radio show, helps Buddy.
Twenty Million Sweethearts
A midwest band leader and his lead singer share a love-hate relationship as they try for success in New York.
Sweet Music
Director William C. McGann's 1935 film stars Gloria Stuart and Ross Alexander as a young couple in love who face economic woes once they're wed.
Maybe It's Love
A star rower is forced to join a good school under a pseudonym because his wealthy dad doesn't like schools that have high academic standards.
Freshman Love
A satire about the power of publicity. Robert Montgomery plays Jeff Bidwell, a dashing Broadway press agent who has his own private club where he cultivates the rich and powerful. With the help of his selfless ex-wife (Madge Evans), Jeff molds an illiterate, suicidal young woman (Sally Eilers) into a celebrity socialite.