left to right: Charles Harbury, Kate Lester, Wood, Mrs. Fiske in Mrs Bumpstead-Leigh 1911.
Douglas Wood (October 31, 1880 – January 13, 1966) was an American actor of stage and screen during the first six decades of the 20th century. During the course of his career, Wood appeared in dozens of Broadway productions, and well over 100 films. Towards the end of his career, he also made several guest appearances on television. Wood died in 1966.
Wood made his Broadway acting debut in the revival of a pair of plays being produced at the Garden Theatre: Cyrano de Bergerac and Beau Brummell.[2][3] Over the next thirty years he appeared in dozens of plays on The Great White Way.[4] He was in the original production of Du Barry, written, directed, and produced by David Belasco, which had a successful run in 1901–02.[5] After appearing in several plays with short runs, he was in another successful play from 1904 to 1905, The College Widow, written by George Ade and directed by George Marion again at the Garden Theatre.[6] In 1910 he appeared in the role of Marc Antony in a repertory production of Julius Caesar at the Garden.[7] In 1913 he began a successful run of The Family Cupboard, by the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, Owen Davis, which ran until 1915.[8] He starred in the musical Maytime, produced by Lee and J.J. Shubert, and written by Rida Johnson Young, who also wrote the words to music composed by Sigmund Romberg. The show ran for almost 500 performances at five theaters from 1917 to 1918.[9] He followed this with another Young hit, Little Old New York, which ran during 1920 and 1921 at Plymouth Theatre.[10] Other hits Wood appeared in included: Give and Take (1923), written by Aaron Hoffman;[11] the 1924 John Henry Mears' production, Sweet Seventeen;[12] the 1927 musical, Bye, Bye, Bonnie, which was also notable as the first Broadway role for Ruby Keeler;[13] and The Good Fairy (1931–32), produced and directed by Gilbert Miller, and performed in the theater named after Miller's father, which also starred Helen Hayes.[14] After another successful run in the musical-comedy Take a Chance at the Apollo Theatre which ran from 1932 to 1933, and starred Ethel Merman,[15] Wood took a 25-year hiatus from the Broadway stage,[4] and devoted his creative talents to Hollywood.[16]
During the 1950s, Wood appeared in a handful of pictures, mostly B-films.[16] During the early and mid-1950s Wood made guest appearances on several television series, including The Lone Ranger (1950–51), Fireside Theater (1952-53), and Topper (1954). His final screen performance was in a small role in That Certain Feeling (1956), starring Bob Hope, Eva Marie Saint, and George Sanders.[25] In 1958 Wood returned to the Broadway stage with a supporting role in Jane Eyre, it was his final acting performance.[26] Wood died on January 13, 1966, in the Woodland Hills area of Los Angeles, California.
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