Dane Clark (born Bernhardt Zanvilevitz; February 26, 1912 – September 11, 1998) was an American character actor who was known for playing, as he labeled himself, "Joe Average."[1]
Early life
Clark was born Bernhardt Zanvilevitz (later Bernard Zanville), the son of Samuel,[2] a sporting goods store owner, and his wife Rose.
His date of birth is a matter of some dispute among different sources.[4]
He graduated from Cornell University in 1936 and earned a law degree in 1938 at St. John's University School of Law[5] in Brooklyn, New York, which was before its current building was constructed at St. John's campus in Queens. During the Great Depression, he worked as a professional boxer, minor league baseball player, construction worker, and model.[1]
Acting career
Modeling brought him in contact with people in the arts. He gradually perceived them to be snobbish, with their talk of the "theatah," and "I decided to give it a try myself, just to show them anyone could do it."[1]
Theatre
Clark with his wife Margot in 1946
Clark's early acting experience included work with the Group Theatre in New York City.[6] He progressed from small Broadway parts to larger ones, eventually taking over the role of George from Wallace Ford in the 1937 production of Of Mice and Men.[1] His other Broadway credits include Mike Downstairs (1968), A Thousand Clowns (1962), Fragile Fox (1954), The Number (1951), Dead End (1935), Waiting for Lefty (1935), Till the Day I Die (1935), and Panic (1935).[7]
Clark got his big break when he was signed by Warner Bros. in 1943. He worked alongside some of his era's biggest stars, often in war movies such as Action in the North Atlantic (1943), his breakthrough part, opposite Humphrey Bogart. According to Clark, Bogart gave him his stage name.[1] Hollywood newspaper columnist Louella Parsons wrote in 1942 that Warner Bros. first changed his name to Zane Clark but then decided on Dane Clark because "Too many confused Zane Clark with Jane Clark."[8]
Exhibitors voted Clark the 16th most popular star at the US box office in 1945.[10] In that same year he had a notable part in an Army Airforce training film, Tail Gunner, which starred actors Ronald Reagan, Burgess Meredith as the main character, Tom Neal and Jonathan Hale.
During the 1950s, he became one of a small group of actors (excluding the original 'founding' members brought in at the Studio's inception) awarded life membership in the Actors Studio.[11]
Clark played Peter Chambers in the short-lived radio program Crime and Peter Chambers,[12] a half-hour show which aired from April 6 to September 7, 1954.
Clark first appeared on television in the late 1940s, and after the mid-1950s worked much more in that medium than in feature films. In the 1954/1955 season, he co-starred as the character Richard Adams in the crime dramaJustice.[13]
On July 1, 1955 while starring in the play The Shrike, the lead actress Isabel Bonner, suffered a brain hemorrhage and died. [14] The scene took place in a hospital, and when Isabel Bonner collapsed on a bed, Dane Clark, ad-libbing, put his arm around Bonner and said, "Ann, speak to me. Is something the matter? What's wrong, darling? I love you." Then, realizing something was wrong, he turned to the wings and said "Bring down the curtain." A film editor in the audience, Harold Cornsweet, later said of the ad-libbed scene: "It was so realistic that people in the audience were crying."[15]
In 1958 he was a guest star on the television series Wagon Train in The John Wilbut Story. Clark played John Wilbut, a man who some on the train believe to be John Wilkes Booth on the run from the assassination of Lincoln.
In 1970, he guest-starred in an episode of The Silent Force and had a role in The McMasters (1970). That same year he appeared as Barton Ellis on The Men From Shiloh, rebranded name of the long running TV Western series The Virginian in the episode titled "The Mysterious Mrs. Tate." He also played Lieutenant Tragg in the short-lived revival of the Perry Mason television series in 1973, and appeared in the 1976 miniseries Once an Eagle. He also appeared seven times on the cop television show Police Story, always playing a Lieutenant but in different roles.
Death
Clark died on September 11, 1998, of lung cancer at St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica, California.[16] His remains were cremated and his ashes given to his widow.[17]
Complete filmography
Clark in a 1956 TV episode of Wire Service
Toils of the Law (1938 short) (as Bernard Zanville)
^Adams, Marjory (September 13, 1943). "Movie Question Box". The Boston Globe. Massachusetts, Boston. p. 7. Retrieved August 3, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
^The three most frequently shown dates are February 26, 1912; February 18, 1913; and February 18, 1915. The Social Security Death Index shows the 1912 date.[3] Age listings consistent with a 1912 birthdate are also found in border crossing information available on Ancestry.com, and 1930 census records. The 1920 census listing is consistent with a 1913 birth date.
^"Bing Crosby Again Box-Office Leader: Van Johnson Second in Film Poll of Exhibitors – Rogers Wins for Westerns". The New York Times. December 28, 1945.
