Warren William was a Broadway and Hollywood actor, born the son of Freeman E. and Frances Krech, as Warren William Krech in Aitkin, Minnesota. He had a certain physical resemblance to John Barrymore. He attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. After moving from Broadway to Hollywood in the silent period, he reached his peak as a leading man in early 1930s pre-Production Code films. He was a contract player at the Warner Bros. studio and was known for portraying amoral businessmen, lawyers, and other heartless types, including the Sam Spade character in the second filming of The Maltese Falcon, called Satan Met a Lady with Bette Davis.

He also played sympathetic roles, however, as in Imitation of Life, in which he portrayed Claudette Colbert’s love interest. He appeared as her love interest again that year, when he played Julius Caesar to her Cleopatra in Cecil B. DeMille’s version of Cleopatra. And he was the swashbucking d’Artagnan in the 1939 version of The Man in the Iron Mask, directed by James Whale.

William was the first to portray Erle Stanley Gardner’s fictional defense attorney Perry Mason on the big screen and starred in four fast paced, comical, and highly entertaining Perry Mason mysteries. He also played Raffles-like reformed jewel thief The Lone Wolf for Columbia Pictures beginning with The Lone Wolf Spy Hunt with Ida Lupino and Rita Hayworth, and he starred as detective Philo Vance in two films in that series, 1934’s The Dragon Murder Case and 1939’s The Gracie Allen Murder Case. In 1923, he married Helen Barbara Nelson; Mrs. Helen B. Krech – who also survived him – was three years his senior. Warren William died on 24 September 1948 in Hollywood, California of multiple myeloma.

The Watson family, known as “the first family of Hollywood”, were made famous in the early days of Hollywood as a family of child actors. Family members included Coy Watson Jr., Bobs, Delmar, Harry, Garry, Billy, Vivian, Gloria, and Louise, all of whom acted in motion pictures.

When Mack Sennett’s Keystone Studios, which was just about 600 feet from the Watson home, needed child actors for film making, their father Coy Watson Sr. would provide the kids. The Watson children worked with some of the big stars in those days, including James Stewart, Lionel Barrymore, Fred Astaire, Shirley Temple, Katharine Hepburn and Henry Fonda.

The Watson brothers also worked as press, newsreel and television photographers during their adult careers.

The family lived by the Echo Park area of Los Angeles. The kids went to nearby Belmont High School and were very active in school activities, including photography and school plays.

Walter John Matthau was an American actor best known for his role as Oscar Madison in The Odd Couple and his frequent collaborations with Odd Couple star Jack Lemmon, as well as his role as Coach Buttermaker in the 1976 comedy The Bad News Bears. He won an Academy Award for his performance in the Billy Wilder film The Fortune Cookie.

Matthau was born in New York City’s Lower East Side on October 1, 1920, the son of Rose Berolsky, who worked in a sweatshop, and Milton Matthau, an electrician and peddler, both Jewish immigrants. His surname has often incorrectly been listed as Matuschanskayasky. As a young boy, Walter attended a Jewish non-profit sleepaway camp, Tranquillity Camp, where he first began acting in the shows the camp would stage on Saturday nights. He also attended Surprise Lake Camp.

During World War II, Matthau served in the U.S. Army Air Forces with the Eighth Air Force in England as a B-24 Liberator radioman-gunner, in the same 453rd Bombardment Group as James Stewart. He reached the rank of staff sergeant and became interested in acting. He took classes in acting at the Dramatic Workshop of The New School in New York with the influential German director Erwin Piscator. He often joked that his best early review came in a play where he posed as a derelict. One reviewer said, “The others just looked like actors in make-up, Walter Matthau really looks like a skid row bum!” Matthau was a respected stage actor for years in such fare as Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? and A Shot in the Dark. He won the 1962 Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a play.

In 1952, Matthau appeared in the pilot of Mr. Peepers with Wally Cox. For reasons unknown he used the name Leonard Elliot. His role was of the gym teacher Mr. Wall. In 1955, he made his motion picture debut as a whip-wielding bad guy in The Kentuckian opposite Burt Lancaster.

Walter Davis Pidgeon was a Canadian actor who lived most of his adult life in the United States. He starred in many motion pictures, including Mrs. Miniver, The Bad and the Beautiful, Forbidden Planet, Advise and Consent and Funny Girl.

Born in Saint John, New Brunswick, Pidgeon attended local schools, followed by the University of New Brunswick, where he studied law and drama. His university education was interrupted by World War I, and he enlisted in the 65th Battery, Royal Canadian Field Artillery. Pidgeon never saw combat, however, as he was severely injured in an accident. He was crushed between two gun carriages and spent 17 months in a military hospital. Following the war, he moved to Boston, where he worked as a bank runner, at the same time studying voice at the New England Conservatory of Music. He was a classically trained baritone.

Discontented with banking, Pidgeon moved to New York City, where he walked into the office of E. E. Clive, announced that he could act and sing, and said was ready to prove it. After acting on stage for several years, he made his Broadway debut in 1925.

Pidgeon made a number of silent movies in the 1920s. However, he became a huge star with the arrival of talkies, thanks to his singing voice. He starred in extravagant early Technicolor musicals, including The Bride of the Regiment, Sweet Kitty Bellairs, Viennese Nights and Kiss Me Again. He became associated with musicals; however, when the public grew weary of them, his career began to falter. He was relegated to playing secondary roles in films like Saratoga and The Girl of the Golden West. One of his better known roles was in The Dark Command, where he portrayed the villain opposite John Wayne, Claire Trevor, and a young Roy Rogers.