Pat O'Brien (actor)

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Pat O'Brien in April 1972

Pat O'Brien (born November 11, 1899 in Milwaukee , Wisconsin , † October 15, 1983 in Santa Monica , California ; actually William Joseph Patrick O'Brien ) was an American actor of Irish descent who, among other things, co-starred acted by James Cagney and Spencer Tracy .

life and career

Pat O'Brien was born to Irish parents in the US state of Wisconsin. He was an acolyte at Gesu Church in Milwaukee in his youth , and later attended Marquette University . At school, O'Brien became close friends with Spencer Tracy . Both originally wanted to be priests, but then joined the Marquette Military Academy. Both ended up in acting via detours. He played on Broadway , among other places . A great success was the play Extrablatt ( The Front Page ) by Ben Hecht , where he played the role of Walter Burns. When the play was filmed in 1931 by Lewis Milestone as The Front Page , however, Adolphe Menjou impersonated the role of Burns and O'Brien took over the partner lead role of Hildy Johnson. This role should give him the breakthrough as a film actor.

While O'Brien usually played the main actor's friend in larger films, he was also the star himself in smaller films. O'Brien played many of his roles with an Irish accent, which he did not speak in real life. Although he had decided against the profession of Catholic priest, he wore the clerical garb very often in his films. The best known example of this is Michael Curtiz 's legendary gangster classic Chicago - Angels with Dirty Faces , where he can be seen alongside James Cagney in the role of Father Connelly. In total, O'Brien was in front of the camera eight times with Cagney in the 1930s, and in his last film Ragtime (1981) the two appeared together for the first time after a 40-year break. Cagney and O'Brien first met in 1926 and have remained friends throughout their lives. In the 1950s, film offers for O'Brien became scarce and he had to concentrate on television work. His old friend Spencer Tracy found it difficult to get O'Brien to play a supporting role in Tracy's film The Last Hurray . One of his few successes during this time was Billy Wilder's comedy Some Like It Hot , where - as in many other films - he plays a police superintendent who dominates the first ten minutes of the classic film, but then only has two small appearances.

O'Brien worked as an actor until shortly before his death and had a total of almost 150 film and television appearances. The actor was considered very conservative. He was married to his wife Eloise Taylor from 1931 until his death, they had four children, three of whom were adopted. He died of a heart attack at the age of 83. Pat O'Brien has been immortalized with two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame . He was buried in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City , California .

Filmography (selection)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from July 19, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / matineeclassics.com
personal data
SURNAME O'Brien, Pat
ALTERNATIVE NAMES O'Brien, William Joseph Patrick (real name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American film actor
DATE OF BIRTH November 11, 1899
PLACE OF BIRTH Milwaukee , Wisconsin
DATE OF DEATH October 15, 1983
Place of death Santa Monica , California