Charles Bickford
Birthday: Born in 1890-12-31 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
Deathday: 1967-11-09
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Charles Bickford (January 1, 1891 – November 9, 1967) was an American actor best known for his supporting roles. He was nominated three times for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, for The Song of Bernadette (1943), The Farmer's Daughter (1947), and Johnny Belinda (1948). Other notable roles include Whirlpool (1948), A Star is Born (1954) and The Big Country (1958). Description above from the Wikipedia article Charles Bickford, licensed under CC-BY-SA,full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
TV Credits
Playhouse 90
Character: Gen. Keaton
Playhouse 90 is an American television anthology series that was telecast on CBS from 1956 to 1960 for a total of 133 episodes. It originated from CBS Television City in Los Angeles, California. Since live anthology drama series of the mid-1950s were usually hour-long shows, the title highlighted the network's intention to present something unusual, a weekly series of hour-and-a-half dramas rather than 60-minute plays. Playhouse 90 began as a pitch by Frank Stanton—the formidable, forward-thinki...
The Man Behind the Badge
Character: Narrator
The Man Behind the Badge is the title of a half-hour American television police drama series which aired on the CBS from 1953-1955 starring and hosted by character actor Charles Bickford. Years later, Bickford appeared as one of the owners of Shiloh Ranch in the NBC western series, The Vrginian. In its first season, The Man Behind the Badge aired on Sundays at 9:30 p.m. EST opposite ABC's Jukebox Jury....
The Barbara Stanwyck Show
Character: Isaiah B. Richardson
The Barbara Stanwyck Show is an American anthology drama television series which ran on NBC from September 1960 to September 1961. Barbara Stanwyck served as hostess, and starred in all but four of the half-hour productions. The four she did not star in were actually pilot episodes of potential series programs which never materialized. Stanwyck won the Emmy Award in 1961 for Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Series. Three of the shows in which Stanwyck starred were an attempt at spinni...
Playhouse 90
Character:
Playhouse 90 is an American television anthology series that was telecast on CBS from 1956 to 1960 for a total of 133 episodes. It originated from CBS Television City in Los Angeles, California. Since live anthology drama series of the mid-1950s were usually hour-long shows, the title highlighted the network's intention to present something unusual, a weekly series of hour-and-a-half dramas rather than 60-minute plays. Playhouse 90 began as a pitch by Frank Stanton—the formidable, forward-thinki...
Bambi-Verleihung
Character: Self (archive footage)
The Bambi, often called the Bambi Award and stylised as BAMBI, is a German award presented annually by Hubert Burda Media to recognize excellence in international media and television to personalities in the media, arts, culture, sports, and other fields "with vision and creativity who affected and inspired the German public that year", both domestic and foreign. First held in 1948, it is the oldest media award in Germany. The trophy is named after Felix Salten's book Bambi, A Life in the Woods ...
Movie Credits
The Dark Wave
Character:
A young girl, normal in every way, is affected with severe epilepsy....
A Star Is Born
Character: Oliver Niles
A movie star helps a young singer-actress find fame, even as age and alcoholism send his own career into a downward spiral....
Rose Hobart
Character: Man (archive footage) (uncredited)
Cornell employs clips from 1931's jungle melodrama East of Borneo – more specifically, clips of its lead actress, Rose Hobart – to disquieting effect. Through Cornell's collage editing, Hobart becomes a singular object of desire and dread, trapped in an exotic paradise....
The Unforgiven
Character: Zeb Rawlins
The neighbors of a frontier family turn on them when it is suspected that their beloved adopted daughter was stolen from the Kiowa tribe....
Duel in the Sun
Character: Sam Pierce
Beautiful half-breed Pearl Chavez becomes the ward of her dead father's first love and finds herself torn between her sons, one good and the other bad....
Fallen Angel
Character: Mark Judd
An unemployed drifter, Eric Stanton wanders into a small California town and begins hanging around the local diner. While Eric falls for the lovely waitress Stella, he also begins romancing a quiet and well-to-do woman named June Mills. Since Stella isn't interested in Eric unless he has money, the lovelorn guy comes up with a scheme to win her over, and it involves June. Before long, murder works its way into this passionate love triangle....
Days of Wine and Roses
Character: Ellis Arnesen
An alcoholic falls in love with and gets married to a young woman, whom he systematically addicts to booze so they can share his "passion" together....
Gangs of New York
Character: Rocky Thorpe / John Franklin
An undercover cop infiltrates a powerful New York based crime syndicate....
The Big Country
Character: Major Henry Terrill
Retired wealthy sea captain Jim McKay arrives in the Old West, where he becomes embroiled in a feud between his future father-in-law, Major Terrill, and the rough and lawless Hannasseys over a valuable patch of land....
Tarzan's New York Adventure
Character: Buck Rand
Circus owner Buck Rand kidnaps Boy to perform in his show. He forces a pilot to fly him, Boy and his animal trainer out of the jungle. Tarzan and Jane follow them to New York....
Brute Force
Character: Gallagher
Timeworn Joe Collins and his fellow inmates live under the heavy thumb of the sadistic, power-tripping guard Captain Munsey. Only Collins' dreams of escape keep him going, but how can he possibly bust out of Munsey's chains?...
Whirlpool
Character: Lt. James Colton
The wife of a psychoanalyst falls prey to a devious quack hypnotist when he discovers she is an habitual shoplifter. Then one of his previous patients now being treated by the real doctor is found murdered, with her still at the scene, and suspicion points only one way....
Anna Christie
Character: Matt Burke
Old sailor Chris Christofferson eagerly awaits the arrival of his grown daughter Anna, whom he sent at five years old to live with relatives in Minnesota. He has not seen her since, but believes her to be a decent and respectably employed young woman. When Anna arrives, however, it is clear that she has lived a hard life in the dregs of society, and that much of spirit has been extinguished. She falls in love with a young sailor rescued at sea by her father, but dreads to reveal to him the truth...
The Woman on the Beach
Character: Tod Butler
A sailor suffering from post-traumatic stress becomes involved with a beautiful and enigmatic seductress married to a blind painter....
Jim Thorpe – All-American
Character: Glenn S. 'Pop' Warner
The triumph and tragedy of Native American Jim Thorpe, who, after winning both the pentathlon and decathlon in the same Olympics, is stripped of his medals on a technicality....
A Big Hand for the Little Lady
Character: Benson Tropp
A naive traveler in Laredo gets involved in a poker game between the richest men in the area, jeopardizing all the money he has saved for the purpose of settling with his wife and child in San Antonio....
Little Miss Marker
Character: Big Steve Halloway
Big Steve Halloway, gambler and proprietor of New York's Horseshoe Cabaret, is in desperate need of money. He arranges for his fellow bookies, especially Sorrowful Jones, to each pay him $1,000 for his racehorse, Dream Prince, to lose. With all bets being placed at the window, Sorrowful encounters a gambler, having lost $500, wanting to place his bet but unable to come up with $20. Instead, he places his little girl, Marthy Jane, as security, or in bookie's terms a "marker". "Marky", as she come...
The Babe Ruth Story
Character: Brother Matthias
The baseball player goes from wayward youth to Boston Red Sox pitcher to New York Yankees home-run hero....
The Farmer's Daughter
Character: Joseph Clancy
After leaving her family's farm to study nursing in the city, a young woman finds herself on an unexpected path towards politics....
The Song of Bernadette
Character: Father Peyramale
In 1858 Lourdes, France, Bernadette, an adolescent peasant girl, has a vision of "a beautiful lady" in the city dump. She never claims it to be anything other than this, but the townspeople all assume it to be the Virgin Mary. The pompous government officials think she is nuts, and do their best to suppress the girl and her followers, and the church wants nothing to do with the whole matter. But as Bernadette attracts wider and wider attention, the phenomenon overtakes everyone in the the town, ...
The Plainsman
Character: John Lattimer
Wild Bill Hickok, Calamity Jane and Buffalo Bill go up against Indians and a gunrunner....
The Raging Tide
Character: Hamil Linder
A San Francisco hood is rubbed out by rival Bruno Felkin, who himself reports the crime to Homicide Lt. Kelsey in an alibi scheme which fails. To escape, he stows away on a fishing boat. At sea, skipper Hamil Linder receives Bruno kindly, teaching him fishing; Bruno enlists Hamil's wayward son Carl to tend his slot machines. Then Carl takes an interest in Bruno's girl Connie. Climax in a storm at sea....
Johnny Belinda
Character: Black MacDonald
A small-town doctor helps a deaf-mute farm girl learn to communicate....
Reap the Wild Wind
Character: Mate of the 'Tyfib'
The Florida Keys in 1840, where the implacable hurricanes of the Caribbean scream, where the salvagers of Key West, like the intrepid and beautiful Loxi Claiborne and her crew, reap, aboard frail schooners, the harvest of the wild wind, facing the shark teeth of the reefs to rescue the sailors and the cargo from the shipwrecks caused by the scavengers of the sea....
Four Faces West
Character: Pat Garrett
Cowboy Ross McEwen arrives in town. He asks the banker for a loan of $2000. When the banker asks about securing a loan that large, McEwen shows him his six-gun collateral. The banker hands over the money in exchange for an I.O.U., signed "Jefferson Davis". McEwen rides out of town and catches a train, but not before being bitten by a rattler. On the train, a nurse, Miss Hollister, tends to his wound. A posse searches the train, but McEwen manages to escape notice. However a mysterious Mexican ha...
Mr. Lucky
Character: Hard Swede
A conman poses as a war relief fundraiser, but when he falls for a charity worker, his conscience begins to trouble him....
Wing and a Prayer
Character: Captain Waddell
An aircraft carrier is sent on a decoy mission around the Pacific, with orders to avoid combat, thus lulling Japanese alertness before the battle of Midway....
High, Wide and Handsome
Character: Red Scanlon
The setting is a small town in 1870s Pennsylvania. Sally Waterson and her father have stopped in town with their traveling medicine show, but when their wagon catches fire, they find themselves stranded. They're taken in by Mrs. Cortlandt and her grandson, Peter, who is trying to set up a pipeline that will supply oil throughout the state. Sally and Peter soon fall in love and marry. Neither their marriage nor Peter's pipe dreams flow too smoothly....
Of Mice and Men
Character: Slim
An intellectually disabled giant and his level headed guardian find work at a sadistic cowboy's ranch in depression era America....
Not as a Stranger
Character: Dr. Dave W. Runkleman
Lucas Marsh, an intern bent upon becoming a first-class doctor, not merely a successful one. He courts and marries the warm-hearted Kristina, not out of love but because she is highly knowledgeable in the skills of the operating room and because she has frugally put aside her savings through the years. She will be, as he shrewdly knows, a supportive wife in every way. She helps make him the success he wants to be and cheerfully moves with him to the small town in which he starts his practice. Bu...
You Can't Run Away from It
Character: A.A. Andrews
A reporter stumbles on a runaway heiress whose story could salvage his career....
Daughter of Shanghai
Character: Otto Hartman
A Chinese-American woman tries to expose an illegal alien smuggling ring....
Riding High
Character: J.L. Higgins
A horse trainer who has fallen on hard times looks to his horse, Broadway Bill, to finally win the big race....
This Day and Age
Character: Louis Garrett
A modern-day tale of gangsterism and revenge. After a notorious mobster murders a Jewish tailor and is let off for the crime, a band of outraged high-school students turns into vigilante crusaders hell-bent on punishing the wrongdoers. Memorable pre-Code moment: the students torturing a gangster by dangling him over a pit filled with rats....
The Last Posse
Character: Sampson Drune
A posse's pursuit of bank robbers ends with loot missing and a sheriff (Broderick Crawford) wounded....
East of Borneo
Character: Allan Clark
Mrs. Linda Randolph treks through darkened jungles to the land of Maradu to find her missing husband Allan, who'd left her years before when he believed she was in love with another. She finds Allan the drunken court physician to a devious prince-- Whose designs on the pair don't include a happy ending....
Stand Up and Fight
Character: Arnold
A southern aristocrat clashes with a driver transporting stolen slaves to freedom....
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell
Character: Gen. Jimmy Guthrie
A dramatization of the American general and his court martial for publically complaining about High Command's dismissal and neglect of the aerial fighting forces....
Scandal for Sale
Character: Jerry Strong
A man is promised $25,000 if he can bring the circulation of a newspaper up to one million....
Mister Cory
Character: Jeremiah Des Plains 'Biloxi' Caldwell
An opportunistic young man from the slums gambles his way to wealth, power and high society....
Panama Flo
Character: Pearl
An engineer makes a thieving entertainer work off her debts as a housekeeper at his jungle mining camp....
Branded
Character: Mr. Lavery
A gunfighter takes part in a scheme to bilk a wealthy cattle family out of half a million dollars by pretending to be their son, who was kidnapped as child....
The Pagan Lady
Character: Dingo Mike
Dot starts out as a bartender in Havana when in walks Dingo Mike (Charles Bickford) and orders up a drink that sounds like something you'd consume on a dare. He drinks the concoction down in one swallow and also manages to outsmart Dot's boss and his rum-running hooligans. You see, Dingo is a bootlegger himself. He literally sweeps the lady off her feet and they set up housekeeping in a tropical hotel full of colorful characters, some of whom are in the bootlegging business too....
The Squaw Man
Character: Cash Hawkins
Jim Wyngate, an English aristocrat, comes to the American West under a cloud of suspicion for embezzlement actually committed by his cousin Lord Henry. In Wyoming, Wyngate runs afoul of cattle rustler Cash Hawkins by rescuing the Indian girl Naturich from Hawkins. Wyngate marries Naturich, but then learns that his cousin Lord Henry has been killed and has cleared his name before dying. As Wyngate has long loved Lady Diana, Lord Henry's wife, he is perplexed at his situation. But fate takes a han...
Hell's Heroes
Character: Bob Sangster
Three bank robbers on the run happen across a woman about to give birth in an abandoned covered wagon. Before she dies, she names the three bandits as her newborn son's godfathers. Remade as Three Godfathers (1936) and 3 Godfathers (1949)....
White Woman
Character: Ballister
A nightclub singer marries the rich owner of a rubber plantation. When she returns with him to his estate in Malaysia, she finds out that he is cruel, vicious and insanely jealous. She and the plantation's overseer develop a mutual attraction, but are terrified at what will happen if her husband finds out....
Dynamite
Character: Hagon Derk
Wealthy Cynthia is in love with not-so-wealthy Roger, who is married to Marcia. The threesome is terribly modern about the situation, and Marcia will gladly divorce Roger if Cynthia agrees to a financial settlement. But Cynthia's wealth is in jeopardy because her trust fund will expire if she is not married by a certain date. To satisfy that condition, Cynthia arranges to marry Hagon Derk, who is condemned to die for a crime he didn't commit. She pays him so he can provide for his little sister....
The Farmer Takes a Wife
Character: Jotham Klore
A farmer tries to convince a girl to leave her life on a canal boat to live with him on his farm....
The Sea Bat
Character: Reverend Sims
The sister of a sponge diver killed by a stingray loves an escaped convict posing as a priest....
Passion Flower
Character: Dan Wallace
A bored society woman invites scandal and heartache when she falls in love with her low-born chauffeur....
A Wicked Woman
Character: Pat Naylor
A woman and her children escape severe poverty and abuse. She successfully betters her family's condition while living with the secret that she killed her abusive husband in order to protect her children from him....
Valley of the Giants
Character: Howard Fallon
A lumberman takes on a sleezy corporate giant wanting to move in and do whatever it takes to drive everyone else out of business....
Roseanna McCoy
Character: Devil Anse Hatfield
It's the Hatfields vs. the McCoys in this 1949 film, with Farley Granger and Joan Evans as the hillbilly Romeo and Juliet whose forbidden romance rekindles a long-standing feud between their respective families....
No Other Woman
Character: Jim Stanley
A steelworker and his aspiring wife make millions when they become partners in a dyeworks. Unfortunately, success does not bring happiness....
Queen of the Yukon
Character: Ace Rincon
The owner of an Alaskan gambling boat and her business partner help thwart a crooked businessman who attempts to steal claims from local miners....
Della
Character: Hugh Stafford
Della Chappell is a very wealthy and incredibly reclusive woman. When a big company wants to develop some land that Della owns, the town sends out Barney Stafford to talk to her. She invites Barney over to negotiate the proposal. Barney soon takes a liking to Della's equally reclusive daughter Jenny Chappell. After spending some time with Jenny, he realizes that Della has a dark secret, one that keeps them from the outside world....
Elopement
Character: Tom Reagan
Two sets of parents frantically race to stop their eloping children's wedding....
River's End
Character: Keith / Conniston
Sgt. Conniston and his alcoholic guide O'Toole are on the trail of an escaped murderer named Keith. When they catch up with him in the farthest reaches of Northern Canada, Keith turns out to be a dead ringer for Conniston. On the way back, the sled overturns, Keith grabs the gun and leaves them to die in the snow. After second thoughts he comes back and brings them to safety at an RCMP emergency cabin. Conniston dies of a frozen lung and Keith takes his place....
Men in Her Life
Character: Flashy Madden
A wealthy ex-bootlegger comes to the rescue of a formerly rich society girl after her gold-digging fiancé leaves her stranded when he finds out she's broke. The bootlegger proposes a deal: he will settle her debts if she teaches him how to be "a gentleman"....
A Notorious Gentleman
Character:
A lawyer sets out to commit the perfect murder....
Red Wagon
Character: Joe Prince
Adapted from Lady Eleanor Smith’s novel, this 1934 feature tells the story of Joe Prince, an orphan child of circus people who, after many struggles, achieves his life-long ambition of owning a circus....
Forbidden Area
Character: Gen. Keaton
Why are so many B-99 bombers from Hibiscus Air Base crashing or simply disappearing? Colonel Price comes up with a terrifying explanation, but will anyone believe him?...
Thunder Below
Character: Walt
Story of an unhappy wife of oil rigger who labors in a Central American oil field. The bored Susan falls in love with Walt's good friend Ken but keeps her husband in the dark about her feelings... until he's plunged into darkness for real when he loses his eyesight. Susan finds her attentions then wandering yet another man, Davis, and Ken urges her to return to Walt....
Under Pressure
Character: Nipper Moran
Two members of a crew of "sandhogs", men who work on an underwater tunnel project, battle each other over the same woman and a rival team of sandhogs to see who will finish their half of the tunnel first, with the winning team getting more money and guaranteed future work....
Vanity Street
Character: Brian Murphy
A New York policeman helps a hungry and penniless young woman start life anew by arranging to get her a job in "The Follies"....
Guilty of Treason
Character: Cardinal Joszef Mindszenty
The story of Cardinal Josef Mindzhenty, a Roman Catholic cardinal from Hungary who spoke out against both the Nazi occupation of his country during World War II and the Communist regime that replaced it after the war....
Mutiny in the Big House
Character: Father Joe Collins
A young man forges a check in order to help his mother, but is caught and sentenced to 14 years in prison......
Girl from God's Country
Character: Bill Bogler
Jim Holden, a young doctor practicing in Alaska, eagerly awaits the arrival of his new nurse, Anne Webster. All of his previous left within a few weeks by the rigors of the Alaskan winter.......
Night Club Scandal
Character: Det. Capt. McKinley
When Dr. Ernest Tindal's wife is murdered, evidence mounts to convict her lover, Frank Marian. But Frank knows he didn't do it........
Rose of the Rancho
Character: Joe Kincaid
It is California in 1852 that only recently being surrendered by Mexico to the United States and admitted into the union. Most of the land-owners of California were the descendants of the Dons who had colonized it a hundred years before and whose title deeds bore the signature and seal of a long-dead Spanish king. But, by a loop-hole in the law, the title-deeds of the Dons could not be recognized, and this opened the door of organized gangs of land-grabbers, such as the one led by Joe Kincaid, t...
Our Leading Citizen
Character: Shep Muir
Lem Schofield, a lawyer in a one-time small-town turned industrialized big city, runs his firm on examples set by Abraham Lincoln and is a friend to the poor. Clay Clinton, his late partner's son joins the firm but is anxious for fast success and considers Schofield's old-fashioned principles antiquated. Being in love with Schofield's daughter and impatient for success he moves to offices supplied by the city's most powerful industrialist, J.T. Tapley, who has plans to use Clay's good family lin...
Thunder Trail
Character: Lee Tate
A wagon train is robbed by a gang of bandits who kill everyone but a pair of young brothers. Years later, the brothers join force to bring the bandits' leader to justice....
Burma Convoy
Character: Cliff Weldon
A truck convoy traveling the Burma Road is menaced by a group of smugglers....
Street of Missing Men
Character: Cash Darwin
An ex-con vows vengeance on the newspaper responsible for putting him behind bars, but has a change of heart when another racketeer threatens to bring the paper down.....
Riders of Death Valley
Character: Wolf Reade
The Saturday matinee crowd got two cowboy stars for the price of one in this lavishly budgeted western serial starring former singing cowboy Dick Foran and Buck Jones. The latter contributed deadpan humor to the proceedings, making Jones perhaps the highest paid B-western comedy relief in history. The two heroes defend the Death Valley borax miners from an outlaw gang headed by Wolf Reade. An extraordinarily strong cast -- for a serial, at least -- supported the stars, headed by Charles Bickford...
Song of the Eagle
Character: Joe (Nails) Anderson
This drama centers on the fight for certain post-Prohibitionist groups to gain total control over the liquor industry. Much of the tale is focused upon a family endeavoring to keep their little brewery....
South Sea Rose
Character: Capt. Briggs
A French girl raised in the south seas is brought to prim and proper New England by her New England born and bred sea captain husband. She wears short skirts and shocks the puritanical New Englanders in her new home with her wild candid ways......
Romance of the Redwoods
Character: Steve Blake
June Martin is a dishwasher in a California logging camp boarding house. Steve Blake fights Jed Malone for her and loses, thus casting suspicion on himself when Malone dies under cloudy circumstances....
Captain Eddie
Character: William Rickenbacker
WWI flyer Eddie Rickenbaker remembers his life which brought him from a car salesman, race driver and pilot in WWI, to an important person in the early years of civil airline service, after his plane crashed in the South Pacific in late 1942....
Prince of Players
Character: Dave Prescott
Prince of Players is a biographical film about the 19th century American actor Edwin Booth....
Command Decision
Character: Elmer Brockhurst
High-ranking officers struggle with the decision to prioritize bombing German factories producing new jet fighters over the extremely high casualties the mission will cost....
The Storm
Character: Bob "Sparks" Roberts
A passenger ship unexpectedly runs into a typhoon....
Complicated Women
Character: Self (archive footage)
Looks at the stereotype-breaking films of the period from 1929, when movies entered the sound era, until 1934 when the Hays Code virtually neutered film content. No longer portrayed as virgins or vamps, the liberated female of the pre-code films had dimensions. Good girls had lovers and babies and held down jobs, while the bad girls were cast in a sympathetic light. And they did it all without apology....
Pride of the Marines
Character: Steve Riley
A Marine sacrifices his adopted son and his girlfriend so that they might find a new and more prosperous life....
East of Java
Character: Red McGovern / Harvey Bowers
Survivors of a shipwreck find refuge on a tropical island--but so do the ship's cargo of lions and tigers....
Days of Wine and Roses
Character: Ellis Arnesen
An alcoholic falls in love with and gets married to a young woman whom he systematically addicts to booze so they can share his "passion" together....
South to Karanga
Character: Jeff Worthing
Passengers bound to an African copper mine at Karanga to quell a native uprising encounter murder and intrigue on the way....
One Hour To Live
Character: Insp. Sid Brady
Gangsters and police cross each other, including murder, in an attempt to cover up crimes....