Wallace Beery — Blue Book of the Screen (1923) 🇺🇸

Wallace Beery, whose recent role of “Richard the Lion Hearted” in “Robin Hood” probably will cause him to be remembered as long as any part he ever played, secured plenty of training for this period upon the throne, for royalty scampered all around him during his earlier stage career.

It seems a long and peculiar jump from “King Dodo” to “Richard,” a leap from the ridiculous to the sublime, but that was the hurdle which Mr. Beery made with success crowding all the interval of years.

During all that long period there were two years with a circus as an elephant trainer, but whether this had to do with his later success as director with the old Essanay, his historian does not state.

Mr. Beery was born in Kansas City, Mo., and lived there until he was eighteen, attending grammar and high schools.

During his first season in motion pictures Mr. Beery did not attract any more attention than scores of other actors in those pioneer days of the film. He joined Essanay, and directed before leaving. Next he played with Universal, and even had a taste of Keystone before coming into general notice as a masterly leading screen character.

Some of the many productions in which Mr. Beery has scored heavily are “Victory” and “Last of the Mohicans,” with Tourneur [Maurice Tourneur]; “The Unpardonable Sin,” “The Golden Snare,” “Tale of Two Cities,” “Behind the Door” and “The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.”

He is six feet tall, weighs 200 pounds and has dark hair and brown eyes. His home is in Hollywood.

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Hollywood now refers to Wallace Beery as “King Richard” since Robin Hood flashed across the screen. But he has a wide range of make-up tricks and has portrayed every character from a Borneo native to a sleek oriental.

Portrait by Roman Freulich (1898–1974) • Los Angeles

Collection: The Blue Book of the Screen (1923)