George Bancroft (actor)

George Bancroft
George Bancroft
	Bancroft in a 1938 promotional photo
Born	September 30, 1882; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Died	October 2, 1956 (aged 74); Santa Monica, California, U.S.
Alma mater	United States Naval Academy
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1925–1942

George Bancroft (September 30, 1882 – October 2, 1956) was an American film actor, whose career spanned seventeen years from 1925 to 1942. A star of pre-Code Hollywood, he is best known as the tough guy lead in four Josef von Sternberg films, the last of which, Thunderbolt (1929) earned him a Best Actor Award nomination. He was later a supporting actor in a number of notable movies, including Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) and Stagecoach (1939).^[1]

Early years

Bancroft was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1882. He attended Tomes Institute in Port Deposit, Maryland.^[2]

Maritime work

After working on merchant marine vessels at age 14, Bancroft was an apprentice on USS Constellation and later served on USS Essex and West Indies. Additionally, during the Battle of Manila Bay (1898), he was a gunner on USS Baltimore.^[3] During his days in the Navy, he staged plays aboard ship.^[4]

In 1900, he swam underneath the hull of the battleship USS Oregon to check the extent of the damage after it struck a rock off the coast of China.^[4] For this, he was appointed to the United States Naval Academy, but found it too restrictive for his tastes and left to pursue a theatrical career.^[4]^{[note 1]}^[3]

Acting career

In 1901, Bancroft began acting in earnest, as he toured in plays and had juvenile leads in musical comedies. In vaudeville, he did blackface routines and impersonated celebrities.^[3] His Broadway credits include the musical comedies Cinders (1923) and The Rise of Rosie O'Reilly (1923).^[1]

One of his early films was The Journey's End (1921).^[2] Bancroft's first starring role was in The Pony Express (1925), and the next year he played an important supporting role in a cast including Wallace Beery, Charles Farrell and Esther Ralston in the period naval widescreen epic Old Ironsides (1926). He then had his finest period as a lead actor, starring in four Paramount productions directed by Josef von Sternberg: Underworld (1927), The Drag Net (1928), The Docks of New York (1928) and Thunderbolt (1929); the latter earning him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor.^{[note 2]}^[5] He played the title role in The Wolf of Wall Street (1929, released just prior to the Wall Street Crash), appeared in Paramount's all-star revue Paramount on Parade (1930) and starred in Rowland Brown's Blood Money (1933), condemned by the censors because they feared the film would "incite law-abiding citizens to crime."^{[citation needed]}

Reportedly, he refused to fall down on set after a prop revolver was fired at him, saying "Just one bullet can't stop Bancroft!".

Bancroft enjoyed his career height in the late 1920s, his thirties' films where he was the leading man, didn't quite have the same impact and by 1936 he had slipped to being a supporting actor; although he still appeared in such classics as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) with Gary Cooper, Angels with Dirty Faces (1938) with James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart, Each Dawn I Die (1939) with Cagney and George Raft, and Stagecoach (1939) with John Wayne and Thomas Mitchell. In 1942, he left Hollywood to be a full-time rancher.

Personal life

Bancroft first married actress Edna Brothers.^[4] Three years later, he married musical comedy star Octavia Broske.^[4] In 1934, Brothers sued him, claiming they had never divorced.^[4] Two years later, the case was settled, and Brothers obtained a divorce.^[4]

Death

On October 2, 1956, Bancroft died in Santa Monica, California, at age 74.^[2] He was interred there in the Woodlawn Memorial Cemetery.^{[citation needed]}

Complete filmography

The Journey's End (1921) as The Ironworker
The Prodigal Judge (1922) as Cavendish
Driven (1923) as Lem Tolliver
Teeth (1924) as Dan Angus
The Deadwood Coach (1924) as Tex Wilson – in play
Code of the West (1925) as Enoch Thurman
The Rainbow Trail (1925) as Jake Willets
The Pony Express (1925) as Jack Slade
The Splendid Road (1925) as Buck Lockwell
The Enchanted Hill (1926) as Ira Todd
Sea Horses (1926) as Cochran
The Runaway (1926) as Lesher Skidmore
Old Ironsides (1926) as Gunner
White Gold (1927) as Sam Randall
Too Many Crooks (1927) as Bert the Boxman
Underworld (1927) as 'Bull' Weed
Tell It to Sweeney (1927) as Cannonball Casey
The Rough Riders (1927) as Happy Joe
The Showdown (1928) as Cardan
The Drag Net (1928) as Two-Gun Nolan
The Docks of New York (1928) as Bill Roberts
The Wolf of Wall Street (1929) as The Wolf
Thunderbolt (1929) as Thunderbolt Jim Lang
The Mighty (1929) as Blake Greeson
Paramount on Parade (1930) as Mug (Impulses)
Ladies Love Brutes (1930) as Joe Forziati
Derelict (1930) as Bill Rafferty
Scandal Sheet (1931) as Mark Flint
Rich Man's Folly (1931) as Brock Trumbull
The World and the Flesh (1932) as Kylenko
Lady and Gent (1932) as Stag Bailey
Blood Money (1933) as Bill Bailey
Elmer and Elsie (1934) as Elmer Beebe
Hell-Ship Morgan (1936) as Captain Ira 'Hell-Ship' Morgan
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) as MacWade
Wedding Present (1936) as Pete Stagg
A Doctor's Diary (1937) as Dr. Clem Driscoll
John Meade's Woman (1937) as Tim Mathews
Racketeers in Exile (1937) as William Waldo
Submarine Patrol (1938) as Capt. Leeds
Angels with Dirty Faces (1938) as Mac Keefer
Stagecoach (1939) as Marshal Curley Wilcox
Each Dawn I Die (1939) as John Armstrong
Espionage Agent (1939) as Dudley Garrett
Rulers of the Sea (1939) as Captain Oliver
Green Hell (1940) as 'Tex' Morgan
Young Tom Edison (1940) as Samuel 'Sam' Edison
When the Daltons Rode (1940) as Caleb Winters
Northwest Mounted Police (1940) as Jacques Corbeau
Little Men (1940) as Major Burdle
Texas (1941) as Windy Miller
The Bugle Sounds (1942) as 'Russ' Russell
Syncopation (1942) as Steve Porter
Whistling in Dixie (1942) as Sheriff Claude Stagg (final film role)

Notes

^ The reference work American Classic Screen Profiles says of Bancroft, "He left the Academy after one year for a theatrical career."
^ The Academy Awards Database provides this comment: "[NOTE: THIS IS NOT AN OFFICIAL NOMINATION. There were no announcements of nominations, no certificates of nomination or honorable mention, and only the winners (*) were revealed during the awards banquet on April 3, 1930. Though not official nominations, the additional names in each category, according to in-house records, were under consideration by the various boards of judges.]"