Oscar Profile #421: Non-nominated Characters

Film history is full of wonderful characters played by actors and actresses, some of whom were in countless films without making on a mark and then suddenly burst into our collective consciousness with one special performance from which they built successful careers, while others came and went with just that one unforgettable performance.

Before 1936, there were no Oscar nominations for supporting performances, although Frank Morgan in The Affairs of Cellini and Franchot Tone in Mutiny on the Bounty managed to snare acting nominations in the Best Actor category which didn’t distinguish between lead and supporting performances. Consequently, many great performances such as those of Billie Burke in A Bill of Divorcement and Dinner at Eight and Edna May Oliver in Little Women and David Copperfield failed to be nominated for iconic work while earning nominations for lesser work in Merrily We Live and Drums Along the Mohawk later in the decade. Others such as Jean Hersholt (The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg, Emma), Warner Oland (The Jazz Singer) and Una O’Connor The Invisible Man, The Informer) never got the awards recognition they deserved, although Hersholt eventually received two honorary awards and later had one named after him.

Some performers, however, not only failed to receive nominations for their one iconic role before or after 1936, they never got another chance at such a role. Here are twelve such performers, five men and seven women, who gave unforgettable performances in films from 1928 through 1959, none whom got another chance at such a role again, some of them despite long careers.

ESSENTIAL FILMS

MARGARET MANN in FOUR SONS (1928), directed by John Ford

The white-haired Scottish character actress who played put-upon, long-suffering or gently maternal roles in American films of the 1920’s and 30’s ended her career with uncredited roles in
such classics as You Can’t Take It with You, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and Gone with the Wind. She had her greatest role as the German mother who loses three sons to World War I and the fourth to America where she joins him in her old age in Four Sons, John Ford’s last great silent film at the age of 60. She died in 1941 at the age of 72.

HENRIETTA CROSMAN in PRIVILEGE (1933), directed by John Ford

The veteran stage actress made her film debut in 1914 and had two other outstanding film roles, first as the matriarch of the acting family in 1930’s The Royal Family of Broadway and as the elderly San Francisco spiritualist in 1936’s Charlie Chan’s Secret. Her greatest screen performance was as the possessive mother who pushes her son into service in World War I rather than see him marry in John Ford’s Pilgrimage. Unable to grieve his loss in the war, it isn’t until she joins other Gold Star mothers on a pilgrimage to France that she comes to terms with her grief. She died in 1944 at 83.

FREDI WASHINGTON in IMITATION OF LIFE (1934), directed by John M. Stahl

Juanita Moore and Susan Kohner were nominated for Oscars for playing the long-suffering black mother and her daughter who passes for white in Douglas Sirk’s 1959 film of Fannie Hurst’s Imitation of Life, roles first played in John M. Stahl’s 1934 version by Louise Beavers and Fredi Washington. Beavers never again had a role quite as good, but she had a long career in films until her death in 1962. Washington, on the other hand, who started her career in the chorus line and reached the heights here, never again had a role anywhere near as good. She died in 1994 at 90.

BLANCHE YURKA in A TALE OF TWO CITIES (1935), directed by Jack Conway

In a couple of shorts in the 1910s, veteran stage actress Blanche Yurka made her talkie debut as the vile, contemptuous Madame De Farge in Jack Conway’s 1935 film version of Charles Dickens’ classic, A Tale of Two Cities. Although she would later stand out in small roles in such films as The Song of Bernadette and The Southerner, she never again achieved the success on film she had with that first impression as the vengeful, bitter hag who knits while the parade of French aristocrats is brought to the gallows and beheaded on the guillotine. She died in 1974 at 86.

EUGENE PALLETTE in MY MAN GODFREY (1936), directed by Gregory La Cava

A screen regular from 1913, roly-poly Eugene Pallette was unforgettable as Friar Tuck in 1938’s The Adventures of Robin Hood and in comic support in the likes of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, The Lady Eve and The Cheaters, but the performance of his career was as Alice Brady’s wisecracking, henpecked husband in Gregory La Cava’s hilarious My Man Godfrey which earned Oscar nominations for William Powell, Carole Lombard and Brady as well as Mischa Auer in a brief role in Pallette’s category for which he himself was oddly overlooked. He died in 1954 at 65.

CECIL CUNNINGHAM in THE AWFUL TRUTH (1937), directed by Leo McCarey

A singer and a vaudeville comedienne prior to her first film in 1929, Cecil Cunningham amassed a stunning 86 credits during a career that lasted until her death 30 years later. She was in four films nominated for a Best Picture Oscar: Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, Kitty Foyle and Blossoms in the Dust were the others, but the one everyone remembers her in was Leo McCarey’s The Awful Truth in which she played Irene Dunne’s beloved Aunt Patsy whose cabin is used for the rendezvous between Dunne and estranged husband Cary Grant in the film’s climax. She died in 1959 at 70.

MARGARET HAMILTON in THE WIZARD OF OZ (1939), directed by Victor Fleming

On the musical stage, she was memorable as everything from Parthy Ann in Show Boat to Mme. Armfeldt in A Little Night Music. On TV, she was the beloved spokeswoman Cora for “good to the last drop” Maxwell House coffee. On screen, despite having over 100 credits, she was known primarily as the Wicked Witch of the West in 1939’s The Wizard of Oz through various incarnations as late of 1970’s Brewster McvCloud and two1976 incarnations on TV’s Sesame Street and Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. She died in 1985 at 82.

JOHN CARRADINE in THE GRAPES OF WRATH (1940), directed by John Ford

With 351 screen credits and 3 famous acting sons, this great character actor should certainly have been nominated for an Oscar along the way, but it wasn’t to be. His greatest role, and the one that should have gotten his there, was as the preacher in John Ford’s The Grapes of Wrath but unlike most others on this list, he was hard to pin down to one role, having been great in so many others films, many directed by Ford such as The Prisoner of Shark Island, Stagecoach, The Last Hurrah and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. He died in 1988 at 82.

FRANK CONROY in THE OX-BOW INCIDENT (1943), directed by William A. Wellman

A Tony winner for 1957’s The Potting Shed which he repeated for TV in 1961, Frank Conroy was a prolific stage actor whose screen career amassed 86 credits including roles in four films nominated for Oscar’s Best Picture including the winner, Grand Hotel as well as The White Parade, The Ox-Bow Incident and The Snake Pit. It’s for William A. Wellman’s The Ox-Bow Incident for which he is best remembered as the hate-driven former Confederate Major Tetely who leads the lynch mob that hangs three innocent men. He died in 1964 at 73.

LEOPOLDINE KONSTANTIN in NOTORIOUS (1946), directed by Alfred Hitchcock

The Austrian born theatre actress made her stage debut in Vienna in 1907 and her film debut in 1910. Moving from Vienna to Berlin in 1912, back to Vienna in 1916, then Berlin again in 1919, she was evacuated to London in 1937. The twice divorced actress lost her only son to the last German bombing of London during World War II. With no film roles since 1937, she was forced to work in a factory until she was at last offered the part of Claude Rains’ venomous, autocratic mother in Alfred Hitchcock’s 1946 masterpiece, Notorious. She later appeared three times on American TV in the 1950s. She died in 1965 at 79.

JUANO HERNANDEZ in INTRUDER IN THE DUST (1949), directed by Clarence Brown

Puerto Rican born Juano Hernandez was the son of a seaman. He was self-educated and spent much of his childhood in Brazil singing on the streets to raise money for food. He became an actor after having been a circus performer, radio actor, and vaudeville performer. He worked in the chorus of the 1927 stage production of the musical “Show Boat”. His breakthrough role as the falsely accused black man in Intruder in the Dust led to equally memorable roles in Stars in My Crown, Kiss Me Deadly and The Pawnbroker among many more. He died in 1970 at 73.

JOSEPH N. WELCH in ANATOMY OF A MURDER (1959), directed by Otto Preminger

The attorney who represented the Army during the Army-McCarthy hearings is most famous for his rebuke of the red-baiting senator: “Fred Fisher is a young man who is starting what looks to be a brilliant career with us. Little did I dream that you could be so reckless, and so cruel, as to do an injury to that lad. Have you no sense of decency, sir; at long last, have you left no sense of decency?” which led to McCarthy’s downfall in 1954. Five years later he proved just as dynamic as the judge in his only acting role in Otto Preminger’s film of Anatomy of a Murder. He didn’t have time to pursue further acting possibilities. He died in 1960 at 69.