John Carradine (born Richmond Reed Carradine; February 5, 1906 – November 27, 1988) was an American actor, best known for his roles in horror films and Westerns as well as Shakespearean theater. A member of Cecil B. DeMille's stock company and later John Ford's company, he was one of the most prolific character actors in Hollywood history. He was married several times, had several children and was the patriarch of the Carradine family, including four of his sons and four of his grandchildren who are or were also actors.

Early life

John Carradine was born in the Greenwich Village section of the Manhattan borough of New York City, the son of Genevieve Winifred (née Richmond), a surgeon, and William Reed Carradine, a correspondent for the Associated Press. William Carradine was the son of evangelical author Beverly Carradine. The family lived in Peekskill and Kingston, New York. William died from tuberculosis when John was two years old. John's mother remarried "a Philadelphia paper manufacturer named Peck, who thought the way to bring up someone else's boy was to beat him every day just on general principle." John attended the Christ Church School in Kingston and the Episcopal Academy in Merion Station, Pennsylvania, where he developed his diction and his memory while memorizing portions of the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer as a punishment.

Carradine's son, David, claimed that his father ran away when David was 14 years old. He returned at some point, as he studied sculpture at Philadelphia's Graphic Arts Institute. John lived with his maternal uncle, Peter Richmond, in New York City for a while, working in the film archives of the public library. David said that while still a teenager, his father went to Richmond, Virginia, to serve as an apprentice to Daniel Chester French, the sculptor who created the statue of Abraham Lincoln for the Lincoln Monument (see notes). He traveled for a time, supporting himself painting portraits. "If the sitter was satisfied, the price was $2.50," he once said. "It cost him nothing if he thought it was a turkey. I made as high as $10 to $15 a day." During this time, he was arrested for vagrancy. While in jail, Carradine was beaten, suffering a broken nose that did not set correctly. This contributed to "the look that would become world famous."

David Carradine said, "My dad told me that he saw a production of Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice when he was eleven years old and decided right then what he wanted to do with his life". He made his stage debut in 1925 in New Orleans in a production of Camille and worked for a time in a New Orleans Shakespeare company. Carradine joined a tent repertory theater under the management of R. D. MaClean, who became his mentor. In 1927, he took a job escorting a shipment of bananas from Dallas, Texas to Los Angeles, where he eventually picked up some theater work under the name of Peter Richmond, in homage to his uncle. He became friends with John Barrymore, and began working for Cecil B. DeMille as a set designer. Carradine, however, did not have the job long. "DeMille noticed the lack of Roman columns in my sketches," Carradine said. "I lasted two weeks." Once DeMille heard his baritone voice, however, he hired him to do voice-overs. Carradine said, "...the great Cecil B. De Mille saw an apparition - me - pass him by, reciting the gravedigger's lines from 'Hamlet,' and he instructed me to report to him the following day." He became a member of DeMille's stock company and his voice was heard in several DeMille pictures, including The Sign of the Cross.

Career

 

Screenshot from The Hurricane (1937)

 

Carradine's first film credit was Tol'able David (1930), but he claimed to have done 70 pictures before getting billing. Carradine tested, along with Conrad Veidt, William Courtenay, Paul Muni, and Ian Keith, for the title role in Dracula, but all contenders lost out to Bela Lugosi. Carradine would later play the Count in the Universal Studios Dracula sequels House of Frankenstein and House of Dracula. Lugosi and Carradine both also tested for the monster role in Frankenstein (1931). By 1933, he was being credited as John Peter Richmond, perhaps in honor of his friend, John Barrymore. He adopted the stage name "John Carradine" in 1935, and legally took the name as his own two years later.

By 1936, Carradine had become a member of John Ford's stock company and appeared in The Prisoner of Shark Island. In total, he made 11 pictures with Ford, including his first important role, as Preacher Casy in The Grapes of Wrath (1940), which starred Henry Fonda. Other Ford films in which Carradine appeared includeThe Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962) and Stagecoach (1939), both with John Wayne.

 

As preacher Casy in The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

 

He also portrayed the Biblical hero Aaron in DeMille's The Ten Commandments (1956).

Carradine did considerable stage work, much of which provided his only opportunity to work in a classic drama context. He toured with his own Shakespearean company in the 1940s, playing Hamlet and Macbeth. His Broadway roles included Ferdinand in a 1946 production of John Webster's The Duchess of Malfi, the Ragpicker in a 13-month run of Jean Giraudoux's The Madwoman of Chaillot, Lycus in a 15-month run of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, and DeLacey in the expensive one-night flop Frankenstein in 1981. He also toured in road companies of such shows as Tobacco Road and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, in which he was properly emaciated as the cancer-ridden Big Daddy, a part, he said, which Tennessee Williams wrote for him.

Carradine claimed to have appeared in more than 450 movies, but only 225 movies can be documented. His count is closer to fact if theatrical movies, made-for-TV movies and television programs are included. He often played eccentric, insane or diabolical characters, especially in the horror genre with which he had become identified as a "star" by the mid-1940s. He occasionally played a heroic role, as in The Grapes of Wrath, in which he played Casy, the ill-fated "preacher", and he occasionally played a sympathetic role, as in Son of Fury: The Story of Benjamin Blake, in which he played Blake's shipmate, who escapes with him to a tropical island full of riches.

He appeared in dozens of low-budget horror films from the 1940s onwards, in order to finance a touring classical theatre company. He sang the theme song to one film in which he appeared briefly, Red Zone Cuba. He also made more than one hundred television appearances, including CBS's My Friend Flicka, Johnny Ringo (as "The Rain Man"), and Place the Face, NBC's Cimarron City as the foreboding Jared Tucker in the episode "Child of Fear" and on William Bendix's Overland Trail in the 1960 episode "The Reckoning," on ABC's Harrigan and Son, The Rebel, and The Legend of Jesse James, and on the syndicated adventure series, Rescue 8, with Jim Davis.

Carradine made recurring appearances as the mortician, Mr. Gateman, on CBS' The Munsters. In 1985, Carradine won a Daytime Emmy Award for his performance as an eccentric old man who lives by the railroad tracks in the Young People's Special, Umbrella Jack.

In 1982, he supplied the voice of the Great Owl in the animated feature The Secret of NIMH. One of Carradine's final film appearances was Peggy Sue Got Married in 1986. Carradine's last released film credit was Bikini Drive-In, released years after his death.

Carradine's deep, resonant voice earned him the nickname "The Voice". He was also known as the "Bard of the Boulevard," due to his idiosyncratic habit of strolling Hollywood streets while reciting Shakespearean soliloquies, something he always denied.

Personal life and death

Carradine was married four times. He married his first wife, Ardanelle McCool Cosner, in 1935. She was mother of Bruce and David. John adopted Bruce, Ardanelle's son from a previous marriage. John had planned a large family but, according to the autobiography of his son David, after Ardanelle had had a series of miscarriages, Carradine discovered that she had had repeated "coat hanger" abortions, without his knowledge, which rendered her unable to carry a baby to full term. After only three years of marriage, Ardenelle Carradine filed for divorce, but the couple remained married for another five years.

They divorced in 1944, when David was seven years old. Carradine left California to avoid court action in the alimony settlement. After the couple engaged in a series of court battles involving child custody and alimony, which at one point landed Carradine in jail, David joined his father in New York City. By this time his father had remarried. For the next few years David was shuffled between boarding schools, foster homes and reform school.

Carradine married Sonia Sorel, who had appeared with him in Bluebeard (1944) immediately following his divorce from Ardanelle in 1945. Sonia, who had adopted the stage name of Sorel, was the daughter of San Francisco brewer, Henry Henius, granddaughter of biochemist Max Henius, and a great-niece of the historian Johan Ludvig Heiberg. Together she and Carradine had three sons, Christopher, Keith and Robert. Their divorce in 1957 was followed by an acrimonious custody battle, which resulted in their sons being placed in a home for abused children as wards of the court. Keith Carradine said of the experience, "It was like being in jail. There were bars on the windows, and we were only allowed to see our parents through glass doors. It was very sad. We would stand there on either side of the glass door crying".

Eventually, Carradine won custody of the children. For the next eight years, Sonia was not permitted to see the children. Robert Carradine said that he was raised primarily by his stepmother, his father's third wife, Doris (Rich) Grimshaw, and believed her to be his mother until he was introduced to Sonia Sorel at a Christmas party when he was 14 years old. He told a journalist, "I said, 'How do you do.' Keith took me aside and said 'That's our real mother.' I didn't know what he was talking about. But he finally convinced me."

When John Carradine married Doris (Erving Rich) Grimshaw in 1957, she already had a son from a previous marriage, Dale, and a son from a later relationship, Michael, both of whom, along with Sonia Sorel's son, Michael Bowen, are sometimes counted among John Carradine's eight sons. She was a one-time studio typist who typed the script to The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and who went on to play a few roles in film and television. Doris died in 1971 in a fire in her apartment in Oxnard, California. The fire was caused by a burning cigarette. She had been rescued from a similar fire just two weeks earlier. At the time of her death, she and Carradine were separated. Carradine was married a fourth time, from 1975 to 1988, to Emily Cisneros, who survived him.

Retired, Carradine suffered from painful and crippling arthritis, before he died from multiple organ failure at Fatebenefratelli Hospital in Milan, Italy on November 27, 1988. Hours before he was stricken, he had climbed the 328 steep steps of Milan's Gothic cathedral, the Duomo. According to David Carradine, he had just finished a film in South Africa and was about to begin a European tour. David was with him, reading Shakespeare to him, when he succumbed to his condition. By the time David and Keith Carradine had arrived at their father's bedside, he was unable to speak. "I was told that his last words were 'Milan: What a beautiful place to die.'" David recalled, "but he never spoke to me or opened his eyes. When he died, I was holding him in my arms. I reached out and closed his eyes. It's not as easy as it is in the movies."

There was a Requiem Mass for John Carradine at St. Thomas the Apostle Hollywood; a church he had founded. Jane Fonda was among those in attendance. An Irish wake followed and eventually he was buried at sea.

Legacy and honors

• For his contribution to the motion picture industry, John Carradine has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6240 Hollywood Blvd.
• In 2003, he was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

Acting legacy

Four of Carradine's five sons became actors: David, Robert, Keith, and Bruce. David had a prolific career, amassing 227 movie and television credits by the time of his death in 2009. He also had a brief Broadway career and produced and directed a number of independent projects. His success often led to work for other members of his family, including his father. The two appeared together in a few films, including The Good Guys and the Bad Guys (1969) and Boxcar Bertha (1972), which was produced by Roger Corman and directed by Martin Scorsese.

David's television series, Kung Fu, featured his father John and half-brother Robert in the episode "Dark Angel". John would appear as the same character, the Reverend Serenity Johnson, in two more episodes: "The Nature of Evil" and "Ambush". David's brothers Bruce and Keith also appeared in the series, with Keith playing David's character as a teenager for a brief period. David, Keith, and Robert appeared together in a humorous cameo on The Fall Guy, on an episode called "October the 31st" in which their father co-starred.

David's daughter, Calista, Robert's daughter Ever, and Keith's son Cade and daughter Martha Plimpton are all actors. David's daughter, Kansas, rides horses in rodeos.

John's son Christopher is an architect and vice-president of Walt Disney Imagineering.

Filmography

1930s

Bright Lights (1930) (uncredited) Tol'able David (1930) (as Peter Richmond) Heaven on Earth (1931) (as Peter Richmond) Forgotten Commandments (1932) (as John Peter Richmond) The Sign of the Cross (1932) (uncredited) The Story of Temple Drake (1933) This Day and Age (1933) (as John Peter Richmond) To the Last Man (1933) (uncredited) The Invisible Man (1933) (uncredited) The Meanest Gal in Town (1934) (uncredited) The Black Cat (1934) (uncredited) Cleopatra (1934) (uncredited) Clive of India (1935) (uncredited) Transient Lady (1935) Cardinal Richelieu (1935) Les Misérables (1935) Bride of Frankenstein (1935) (uncredited) Alias Mary Dow (1935) (uncredited) She Gets Her Man (1935) The Crusades (1935) (voice) (uncredited) Dublin in Brass (1935) (uncredited) Bad Boy (1935) (uncredited) The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo (1935) (uncredited) Anything Goes (1936) (uncredited) The Prisoner of Shark Island (1936) A Message to Garcia (1936) (voice) (uncredited) Captain January (1936) (scenes deleted) Under Two Flags (1936) Half Angel (1936) (uncredited) White Fang (1936) Mary of Scotland (1936) Ramona (1936) Dimples (1936) The Garden of Allah (1936) Daniel Boone (1936) Winterset (1936) Laughing at Trouble (1936) Nancy Steele Is Missing! (1937) Captains Courageous (1937) Charlie Chan at the Olympics (1937) (scenes deleted) This Is My Affair (1937) Love Under Fire (1937) Danger - Love at Work (1937) Ali Baba Goes to Town (1937) The Hurricane (1937) The Last Gangster (1937) Thank You, Mr. Moto (1937) International Settlement (1938) Of Human Hearts (1938) Four Men and a Prayer (1938) Kentucky Moonshine (1938) Alexander's Ragtime Band (1938) Kidnapped (1938) I'll Give a Million (1938) Gateway (1938) Submarine Patrol (1938) Jesse James (1939) Mr. Moto's Last Warning (1939) Stagecoach (1939) The Three Musketeers (1939) The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939) Captain Fury (1939) Five Came Back (1939) Frontier Marshal (1939) Drums Along the Mohawk (1939)

1940s

The Grapes of Wrath (1940) The Return of Frank James (1940) Brigham Young - Frontiersman (1940) Chad Hanna (1940) Western Union (1941) Blood and Sand (1941) Man Hunt (1941) Swamp Water (1941) Whispering Ghosts (1942) Son of Fury: The Story of Benjamin Blake (1942) Northwest Rangers (1942) Reunion in France (1942) I Escaped from the Gestapo (1943) Captive Wild Woman (1943) Hitler's Madman (1943) Silver Spurs (1943) Isle of Forgotten Sins (1943) aka Monsoon Revenge of the Zombies (1943) Gangway for Tomorrow (1943) Voodoo Man (1944) The Adventures of Mark Twain (1944) The Black Parachute (1944) The Invisible Man's Revenge (1944) Waterfront (1944) The Mummy's Ghost (1944) Return of the Ape Man (1944) Barbary Coast Gent (1944) Bluebeard (1944) Alaska (1944) House of Frankenstein (1944) It's in the Bag! (1945) Fallen Angel (1945) Captain Kidd (1945) House of Dracula (1945) The Face of Marble (1946) Down Missouri Way (1946) The Private Affairs of Bel Ami (1947) C-Man (1949)

1950s

Female Jungle (1954) Casanova's Big Night (1954) Johnny Guitar (1954) The Egyptian (1954) Thunder Pass (1954) Stranger on Horseback (1955) The Kentuckian (1955) Desert Sands (1955) Dark Venture (1956) The Court Jester (1956) Hidden Guns (1956) The Black Sleep (1956) The Ten Commandments (1956) Around the World in Eighty Days (1956) The Incredible Petrified World (1957) Half Human: The Story of the Abominable Snowman (1957) The True Story of Jesse James (1957) The Unearthly (1957) The Story of Mankind (1957) Hell Ship Mutiny (1957) Showdown at Boot Hill (1958) The Proud Rebel (1958) The Last Hurrah (1958) The Cosmic Man (1959) Invisible Invaders (1959) Invasion of the Animal People (1959) The Oregon Trail (1959)

1960s

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1960) Tarzan the Magnificent (1960) Sex Kittens Go to College (1960) The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962) Genesis (1964) Curse of the Stone Hand (1964) The Patsy (1964) Cheyenne Autumn (1964) The Wizard of Mars (1965) House of the Black Death (1965) Broken Sabre (1965) The Emperor's New Clothes (1966) Billy the Kid vs. Dracula (1966) Munster, Go Home! (1966) Night Train to Mundo Fine (1966) Dr. Terror's Gallery of Horrors (1967) Hillbillys in a Haunted House (1967) The Hostage (1967) La Señora Muerte (1967) aka Madame Death Antologia del miedo (1968) Autopsia de un fantasma (1968) Enigma de muerte (1968) Pacto diabólico (1968) aka Diabolical Pact They Ran for Their Lives (1968) Las Vampiras (1968) The Mummy and the Curse of the Jackals (1969) The Astro-Zombies (1969) The Trouble with Girls (1969) Blood of Dracula's Castle (1969) The Good Guys and the Bad Guys (1969)

1970s

Hell's Bloody Devils (1970) aka The Fakers (TV title) Blood of the Iron Maiden (1970) aka Trip to Terror (reissue title) Horror of the Blood Monsters (1970) aka Creatures of the Prehistoric Planet, Creatures of the Red Planet, Space Mission to the Lost Planet, Vampire Men of the Lost Planet (TV title) Five Bloody Graves (1970) Myra Breckinridge (1970) The McMasters (1970) Bigfoot (1970) Honey Britches (1971) (uncredited) Cain's Cutthroats (1971) Blood Legacy (1971) Beast of the Yellow Night (1971) Shinbone Alley (1971) (voice) The Seven Minutes (1971) Shadow House (1972) Blood of Ghastly Horror (1972) Boxcar Bertha (1972) Portnoy's Complaint (1972) (voice) Richard (1972) Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask) (1972) Terror in the Wax Museum (1973) The Gatling Gun (1973) Bad Charleston Charlie (1973) Superchick (1973) Hex (1973) Moonchild (1973) The House of Seven Corpses (1974) Silent Night, Bloody Night (1974) Young Frankenstein (1974) (scenes deleted) Mary, Mary, Bloody Mary (1975) Won Ton Ton, the Dog Who Saved Hollywood (1976) The Shootist (1976) The Killer Inside Me (1976) The Last Tycoon (1976) The Lady and the Lynchings (1977) Crash! (1977) The Sentinel (1977) The White Buffalo (1977) Satan's Cheerleaders (1977) Shock Waves (1977) The Mouse and His Child (1977) (voice) Golden Rendezvous (1977) aka Nuclear Terror (TV title) Doctor Dracula (1978) aka Svengali Sunset Cove (1978/I) Vampire Hookers (1978) The Bees (1978) Monster (1979) aka The Toxic Horror Nocturna: Granddaughter of Dracula (1979) Americathon (1979) (scenes deleted)

1980s

The Long Riders (1980) (scenes deleted) The Monster Club (1980) The Boogeyman (1980) Frankenstein Island (1981) The Howling (1981) Goliath Awaits (1981) Missile X: The Neutron Bomb Incident (1981) The Nesting (1981) aka Massacre Mansion The Vals (1982) aka Valley Girls The Scarecrow (1982) Rose for Emily (1982) Satan's Mistress (1982) The Secret of NIMH (1982) (voice) House of the Long Shadows (1983) Prison Ship (1984) The Ice Pirates (1984) Evils of the Night (1985) Revenge (1986) (direct to video) aka Revenge: Blood Cult 2 Peggy Sue Got Married (1986) The Tomb (1986) Evil Spawn (1987) Monster in the Closet (1987)

1990s

Buried Alive (1990) Jack-O (1995) Bikini Drive-In (1995)