John torments

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John Qualen (born December 8, 1899 in Vancouver , † September 12, 1987 in Torrance , California ; actually Johan Mandt Kvalen ) was a Canadian theater and film actor with Norwegian roots.

Life

Torment was as Johan Mandt Kvalen in Vancouver , the son of Norwegian born immigrants. His father was a Protestant pastor who changed the family name from Kvalen to Qualen. The family soon moved to Illinois , where Qualen grew up in Elgin . After winning a rhetoric competition, John Qualen received a scholarship to Northwestern University , where he gained his first experience as an actor. In 1929 he went to New York to play on Broadway . There he made his breakthrough in Elmer Rice's play Street Scene as a Swedish caretaker, which he embodied again two years later in his debut film, the original screen adaptation of the same name, The Angel of the Road (1931). That same year he worked with director John Ford for the first time when he appeared in a minor supporting role in the film Arrowsmith . Over the next 35 years, Toren starred in a number of Ford's films, including The Fruits of Wrath (1940), and often alongside John Wayne , such as The Long Road to Cardiff (1940), The Black Hawk (1956) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962).

Qualen, who often spoke with a Scandinavian accent in his roles , has appeared as a character actor in well over 100 films, including the classic Casablanca (1942) in the role of the shy resistance fighter Berger. He also had a prominent supporting role at the side of Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant in the screwball comedy His Girl for Special Cases (1940), where he played the mentally confused and his fate indifferent murderer Earl Williams. From the 1950s onwards, it was often used in American television series, for example in Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1956), Bonanza (1961), Dr. Kildare (1964) and The Streets of San Francisco (1973). Qualen retired from acting in 1974 after a guest role in the television series Adventures of the Country Road .

From 1924 he was married to Pearle Larson. Together they had three daughters, Elizabeth, Kathleen and Meredith. Qualen went blind in the last years of his life. He died of heart failure in Torrance, California, in 1987 and was buried in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale .

Filmography (selection)

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Torment, John
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kvalen, Johan Mandt (real name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Canadian theater and film actor of Norwegian origin
DATE OF BIRTH December 8, 1899
PLACE OF BIRTH Vancouver
DATE OF DEATH September 12, 1987
Place of death Torrance , California