Louis Calhern
Biography
Carl Henry Vogt (February 19, 1895 – May 12, 1956), known professionally as Louis Calhern, was an American stage and screen actor. For portraying Oliver Wendell Holmes in the film The Magnificent Yankee (1950), he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor. Calhern began working in silent films for director Lois Weber in the early 1920s; the most notable being The Blot in 1921. A 1921 newspaper article commented, "The new arrival in stardom is Louis Calhern, who, until Miss Weber engaged him to enact the leading male role in What's Worth While?, had been playing leads in the Morosco Stock company of Los Angeles." In 1923 Calhern left the movies, but would return to the screen eight years later after the advent of sound pictures. He was primarily cast as a character actor in films while he continued to play leading roles on the stage. He reached his peak in the 1950s as a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer contract player. Among his many memorable screen roles were Ambassador Trentino in the Marx Brothers classic Duck Soup (1933) and three that he appeared in at MGM in 1950: a singing role as Buffalo Bill in the film version of the musical Annie Get Your Gun, the double-crossing lawyer and sugar-daddy to Marilyn Monroe in John Huston's film noir The Asphalt Jungle, and his Oscar-nominated performance as Oliver Wendell Holmes in The Magnificent Yankee (re-creating his role from the Broadway stage). He was also praised for his portrayal of the title role in the John Houseman production of Julius Caesar (adapted from the Shakespeare play) in 1953, directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz. Calhern also played the role of the devious George Caswell, the manipulative board member of Tredway Corporation in the 1954 production of Executive Suite. Calhern's other film roles included the grandfather in The Red Pony (1949), adapted from the novel by John Steinbeck and starring Robert Mitchum, and the spy boss of Cary Grant in the Alfred Hitchcock suspense classic Notorious (1946). A performance as Uncle Willie in High Society (1956), a musical remake of The Philadelphia Story, turned out to be his final film. Description above from the Wikipedia article Louis Calhern, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Known For
Captain Paul Prescott
Notorious
Ambassador Trentino
Duck Soup
Harry Gaines
The Last Moment
Narrator (voice) (uncredited)
It's a Big Country
Uncle Willie
High Society
Freddie Melrose
We're Not Married!
Grandfather
The Red Pony
Col. Buffalo Bill Cody
Annie Get Your Gun
Jim Murdock
Blackboard Jungle
Verne Coolan
Devil's Doorway
Charles Y. Bewell
Forever, Darling
Col. Zapt
The Prisoner of Zenda
Boris Morosov
Arch of Triumph
Colonel Piniev
The Red Danube
'Dapper Dan' Barker
Blonde Crazy
Joe Finn
20,000 Years in Sing Sing
George Nyle Caswell
Executive Suite
Horatio Robinson
Two Weeks with Love
De Villefort Jr.
The Count of Monte Cristo
Major Jim Day
Sweet Adeline
Dr. Kessler
Fifth Avenue Girl
Alonzo D. Emmerich
The Asphalt Jungle
Julius Caesar
Julius Caesar
King of Karlsberg
The Student Prince
Randolph Van Cleve
Heaven Can Wait
Leo Young
The Woman Accused
Mileaway Russell
Okay, America!
Asst. District Attorney John Wade
Afraid to Talk
Dick Bolton
Night After Night
Steve Dutton
Frisco Jenny
Stanley Vance
The Man with Two Faces
Charles Theverner
The Man with a Cloak
Gen. Ten Eyck
Betrayed
James A. Michener
Men of the Fighting Lady
Dr. Brockdorf
Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet
Oliver Wendell Holmes
The Magnificent Yankee
Nicholas Durant
Rhapsody
Grandpa Ulysses Mulvain
Athena
Leroy Sunderland
The Gorgeous Hussy
Christopher Bruno
The World Gone Mad
Don Andre - The Viceroy
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
Ottaviano
The Affairs of Cellini
Colonel Ashley
Up in Arms
Simon Bowker
Invitation
Gregory Elliott
Nancy Goes to Rio
Nahreeb
The Prodigal
Elias Z. Bannerman
Fast Company
Steve Perry
Stolen Heaven
Sheriff Jake Mannen
The Arizonian
Dr. Martin Sumner Duveen
I Take This Woman
Prefect Allus Martius
The Last Days of Pompeii
Charles W. Birch
Washington Story
Grandfather Eduardo Santos
Latin Lovers
Jim Leversoe
A Life of Her Own
Dr. George March
The Road to Singapore
Benjamin Goodman
Remains to Be Seen
Joe Sorrell
Her Husband Lies
Smiley
Woman Wanted
Arthur Aldrich
Charlie McCarthy, Detective
Phil West
The Blot
Ford Humphries
They Call It Sin
Winkelreid
Diplomaniacs
Self
Main Street to Broadway
Opie Bedloe
Confidentially Connie
Georgia Lorrison's Father (voice) (uncredited)
The Bad and the Beautiful
Jack Magruder
Strictly Personal
LeMarc
Juarez
Curtis Farnsworth
Nobody's Darling
Major Dort
The Life of Emile Zola
David Graham
Too Wise Wives
(archive footage)
That's Entertainment, Part II
'Squire' Elton
What's Worth While?
Personal Info
Known For
Acting
Known Credits
72
Gender
Male
Birthday
1895-02-18
Place of Birth
Brooklyn [now in New York City], New York, USA
Also Known As
Carl Henry Vogt