Edmund Gwenn Extremely Rare Very Early Autographed Photo '13 Miracle 34th Them!

Description: Here is an extraordinarily rare extremely early vintage original autographed postcard photo of the wonderful character actor Edmund Gwenn (1877-1959), from the 1913 theater production of Shock-Headed Peter aka Struwwelpeter, based on the collection of scary children's poems by Dr. Heinrich Hoffman, first translated into English in 1848. Known for Them!, Miracle on 34th Street, Pride and Prejudice, the Lassie movies, Sylvia Scarlett, Foreign Correspondent, and many other classics. There are very few character actors from the 1930s, '40s or '50s who rose to the rank of stardom. In 1895, at the age of eighteen, he made his first appearance on the English stage with a group of amateurs just turned professional, playing two roles, "Dodo Twinkle" and "Damper", in "Rogue and Vagabond". For a long time afterward, he refused to go on stage without a false beard or some other disguise, fearing someone would recognize him and tell his father (it's a bit ironic, by the way, that Edmund's younger brother Arthur would also become an actor using the name of Arthur Chesney). During the next few years, roles were hard to come by but, by 1899, he made his first appearance on the West End in London in "A Jealous Mistake". This was followed by ten years in the hinterlands acting with stock and touring companies, gradually working his way up from small parts to juicier roles. While with Edmund Tearle's Repertory Company, which toured the provinces, he played a different role each night. It was excellent training, in that he acted in everything from William Shakespeare to old melodrama. About this time, he married Minnie Terry, niece of the more famous actress Ellen Terry, a marriage that evidently was short-lived. Most sources list it as beginning and ending in 1901, perhaps only for a matter of days or even hours. From that point, Gwenn would remain a bachelor for the rest of his life. He seems to have preferred not going into any details about the marriage and divorce, and Minnie Terry, who outlived Gwenn, apparently never mentioned what happened, at least not publicly. That same year, however, he went to Australia and acted there for three years, not returning to London until 1904. There, he took a small part in "In the Hospital", which led to his receiving a postcard from George Bernard Shaw, offering him a leading role as "Straker", the Cockney chauffeur, in "Man and Superman". Gwenn accepted (by this time he was Edmund Gwenn) and the play was a success. Shaw became a sort of professional godfather for him. He appeared in "John Bull's Island", "Major Barbara", "You Never Can Tell", "Captain Brassbound's Conversion" and "The Devil's Disciple", all by Shaw. He spent three years in Shaw's company, years which he called "the happiest I've ever had in the theatre". From 1908 until 1915, he performed in new plays by noted playwrights of the time, including John Masefield's "The Campden Wonder", 'John Galsworthy''s "Justice" and "The Skin Game", J.M. Barrie's "What Every Woman Knows" and "The Twelve Pound Look", as well as Henrik Ibsen's "The Wild Duck" and Harley Granville-Barker's "The Voysey Inheritance". By this time, World War I had started and Gwenn, despite his poor eyesight, was inducted into the British Army. Most of his time during "The Great War" was spent drawing supplies up to the front lines, while under fire. He was so successful at this task that, after a year as a private, he received a steady stream of promotions until eventually becoming a captain. His first appearance on screen was in a British short, The Real Thing at Last (1916) in 1916, while he was still in the army. His next film roles were in Shaw's How He Lied to Her Husband (1931) and J.B. Priestley's The Good Companions (1933). He was also in Unmarried (1920) in 1920 and a silent version of "The Skin Game" (The Skin Game (1921)) as "Hornblower", a role he would reprise in 1931 for a talking version (The Skin Game (1931)) directed by Alfred Hitchcock. From then on, Gwenn was to work steadily until the end of his life. He appeared in English stage plays and films, eventually doing more and more on Broadway and in Hollywood. For example, he played the amiable counterfeiter in "Laburnum Grove" in 1933 (later to become the film Laburnum Grove (1936) in which he would star) and then with the entire British company brought it to New York. He was also a huge success in "The Wookey" in 1942, playing a Cockney tugboat captain. That same year, he appeared as "Chebutykin" in Anton Chekhov's "The Three Sisters", with Katharine Cornell, Ruth Gordon and Judith Anderson. In such illustrious company, Gwenn was hailed by critics as "magnificent" and "superlatively good". In 1935, RKO summoned him to Hollywood to portray Katharine Hepburn's father in Sylvia Scarlett (1935). From then on, he was much in demand, appearing in Anthony Adverse (1936), All American Chump (1936), Parnell (1937), and A Yank at Oxford (1938). In 1940, he was the delightful "Mr. Bennet" in Pride and Prejudice (1940), then made a 180-degree turn by playing a folksy assassin in Alfred Hitchcock's Foreign Correspondent (1940). The year 1941 brought Cheers for Miss Bishop (1941), One Night in Lisbon (1941), The Devil and Miss Jones (1941) and Scotland Yard (1941). Then came Charley's Aunt (1941), in which he romanced Jack Benny, masquerading as a woman. Other important films included A Yank at Eton (1942), The Meanest Man in the World (1943), The Keys of the Kingdom (1944) and Between Two Worlds (1944). In 1945, he played villain "Albert Richard Kingby" in Dangerous Partners (1945). There is a peculiar scene in this film, which makes one wonder what director Edward L. Cahn was thinking. James Craig and Signe Hasso, the hero and heroine, are being held by the villainous Gwenn in a room, when Gwenn comes in to interrogate them. In the midst of this, the 33-year-old, 6'2" Craig punches the 68-year-old, 5'5" Gwenn in the belly and then forces the doubled-over Gwenn to release them. Admittedly, Craig and Hasso must escape, and Gwenn's character is pretty evil, but knocking the wind out of the old man makes Craig seem like a bully and far less sympathetic. After "Dangerous Partners", Gwenn was in Bewitched (1945), She Went to the Races (1945), Of Human Bondage (1946), Undercurrent (1946), Life with Father (1947), Green Dolphin Street (1947) and Apartment for Peggy (1948). In Thunder in the Valley (1947), he played one of his most unlikable characters, a father who beats his son, smashes his violin and shoots his dog. Then in 1947, he struck it rich. Twentieth Century-Fox was planning Miracle on 34th Street (1947). It had offered the role of "Kris Kringle" to Gwenn's cousin, the well-known character actor Cecil Kellaway, but he had turned it down with the observation that "Americans don't like whimsy". Fox then offered it to Gwenn, who pounced on it. His performance was to earn him an Academy Award as Best Supporting Actor (at age 71) and, because it is rerun every Christmas season, he would become for many their all-time favorite screen Santa. Accepting the award, Gwenn said, "Now I know there is a Santa Claus". He beat out some stiff competition: Charles Bickford (The Farmer's Daughter (1947)), Thomas Gomez (Ride the Pink Horse (1947)), Robert Ryan (Crossfire (1947)) and Richard Widmark (Kiss of Death (1947)). As soon as he got the part, Gwenn went to work turning himself into Santa Claus. Though rotund, Gwenn didn't feel he was rotund enough to look like the jolly old elf most people expected after having read Clement Moore's "The Night before Christmas", in which Santa "had a broad face and a little round belly / That shook when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly." He could of course wear padding, but he resisted that as too artificial. So he put on almost 30 pounds for the role, a fair amount for a man of his short stature, and added nearly five inches to his waistline. The problem was that after the film was finished, Gwenn found it hard to lose the extra weight. "I've been stocky all my adult life," he said, "but now I must accept the fact that I'm fat." As was his nature, he didn't get upset, and instead was able to laugh about it. Six years later, when playing an elderly professor in The Student Prince (1954), he had a scene in which he entered the Prince's chamber, struggling with the buttons of a ceremonial uniform. The line he was given was, "I'm too old to wear a uniform," but Gwenn suggested a change which stayed in the finished film, "I'm too old and fat to wear a uniform." Gwenn had lost his hair early on, and had no more concern about it than he did about his portliness. In a fair number of films, such as Pride and Prejudice (1940), he appears bald, but he also played many roles with a toupee if he felt that worked better for the character. He would select a hairpiece that helped achieve the look he was after for the role. As regards the rest of his appearance, Gwenn is commonly listed as 5'6" tall, which may have been accurate when he was a younger man, but by the time he was a Hollywood regular he appears to be at least two inches shorter. Plagued by weak eyesight since his youth, Gwenn wore a pince-nez for a while, and then glasses, off-screen and sometimes on. Though he enjoyed fine clothes, he does not seem to have been in the least bit vain about any physical shortcomings he may have had. He looked a bit like a benign clergyman, perhaps of the Anglican faith, an image enhanced by his soft, almost soothing voice. He once said he was "always short and stocky, and not a particularly handsome thing. I could never play romantic leads." After "Miracle on 34th Street," however, Gwenn was a star and constantly in demand, especially when the role called for a kindly eccentric. Gwenn remained a British subject all his life. When he first moved to Hollywood, he lived at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills. His home in London had been reduced to rubble during the bombings by the Luftwaffe in World War II. Only the fireplace survived. What Gwenn regretted most was the loss of the memorabilia he had collected of the famous actor Henry Irving. Eventually Gwenn bought a house at 617 North Bedford Drive in Beverly Hills, which he was to share with his secretary and "confidential man", Ernest C. Bach, and later with former Olympic athlete Rodney Soher. The year 1950 brought a pair of interesting films. In Louisa (1950) he and Charles Coburn were romantic rivals for the hand of Spring Byington. In one scene Gwenn socks Coburn in the jaw, though Coburn later bests him in arm wrestling. Gwenn wins Byington's hand in the end. He was also delightful in Mister 880 (1950) as a kindly counterfeiter. Gwenn received his second Oscar nomination for his performance, though this time he lost out to George Sanders in All About Eve (1950) He did, however, win the Golden Globe Award. In 1952 he appeared in Sally and Saint Anne (1952) as Grandpa Patrick Ryan, affecting an Irish brogue for the role. He played football coach Pop Doyle, teamed up with a chimpanzee, in Bonzo Goes to College (1952). "The Student Prince" followed in 1954, as did the science-fiction classic Them! (1954). This film raises an interesting observation. The year before, Cecil Kellaway had appeared in another sci-fi classic, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953). Watch the two films together and you'll see that the two cousins are playing essentially the same role, that of an elderly scientist with a lovely daughter who is able to provide the hero, and the audience, with some scholarly background on the dangers they face. The two actors could easily have switched roles. "Them!" is noteworthy, too, in that it was a particularly physically painful part for Gwenn. By this time he was 77 and suffering from advanced arthritis. Several scenes in the movie were filmed in the desert, where the temperature often reached 110 degrees. The costumer had outfitted him in a wool suit for some of the early scenes. Joan Weldon, who played his daughter, has noted that Gwenn was in great discomfort and almost certainly could not have continued without the help of his valet, Ernest. The next year Gwenn was in It's a Dog's Life (1955) and The Trouble with Harry (1955). His film work has some interesting patterns. "Dog's Life" was at least the third time Gwenn made a film centered on a dog. He had already co-starred with Pal as Lassie in Lassie Come Home (1943) and Challenge to Lassie (1949). "Harry" was Gwenn's fourth picture directed by Alfred Hitchcock, the others being "The Skin Game", Strauss' Great Waltz (1934) and "Foreign Correspondent". Gwenn's last feature film was The Rocket from Calabuch (1956), shot in Spain and released in 1958, when he was 81. As for TV, his most memorable role may have been as a snowman that comes to life in a Christmas night telecast on The Ford Television Theatre (1952) from a story by Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Heart of Gold". Gwenn's final days were spent at the Motion Picture Home in Woodland Hills, California. Having endured terrible arthritis for many years, he had suffered a stroke, and then contracted pneumonia, from which he died at age 81 on September 6, 1959. His body was cremated, and his ashes are buried in a vault at The Chapel of the Pines in Los Angeles. Gwenn had appointed Rodney Soher as the executor of his will, in which he had left Minnie Terry one-third of his estate, his sister Elsie Kellaway a third, and Ernest Bach a third, in addition to his clothes, shoes, linens, ties and luggage. However, for some reason, while he was spending his last days at the Motion Picture Home, Gwenn signed a codicil to his will, in which he said he had given Bach the lump sum of $5000, and that was all he was to receive. After Gwenn's death, Bach challenged the codicil, claiming that Gwenn was not of sound mind while in the Home and that some unnamed person--possibly referring to Soher--had unduly influenced Gwenn to change his will. The outcome is not known. There is a story that has been around for years that shortly before he died a visitor observed, "It must be hard [to die]", to which Gwenn replied, "Dying is easy. Comedy is hard". The story and the wording vary somewhat from teller to teller. Gwenn may indeed have said it, but he may have been repeating someone else. The quotation has also been ascribed to several earlier wits, including his mentor George Bernard Shaw and the famous actor Edward Keane. Gwenn's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame can be found at 1751 Vine Street. Staining upper border, minor corner and edge wear. Extremely rare. Will ship worldwide. I always combine shipping on multiple orders. Filmography: Alfred Hitchcock Presents (TV Series)Joe Saunders- Father and Son (1957) ... Joe Saunders 1957Playhouse 90 (TV Series)Jack Baldwin- The Greer Case (1957) ... Jack Baldwin 1956The Rocket from CalabuchProf. Jorge Serra Hamilton 1955It's a Dog's LifeJeremiah Edward Emmett Augustus Nolan 1955Matinee Theatre (TV Series)- Santa Is No Saint (1955) 1955The Trouble with HarryCapt. Albert Wiles 1955Science Fiction Theatre (TV Series)Dr. Pliny / Dr. Lorenz- A Visit from Dr. Pliny (1955) ... Dr. Pliny- The Strange Doctor Lorenz (1955) ... Dr. Lorenz 1955The Eddie Cantor Comedy Theater (TV Series)Tweedy- Man Who Liked Little People (1955) ... Tweedy 1955The Millionaire (TV Series)Walter Clinton Carter- The Walter Carter Story (1955) ... Walter Clinton Carter 1955The Star and the Story (TV Series)Paddy- The Great Shinin' Saucer of Paddy Faneen (1955) ... Paddy 1954Them!Dr. Harold Medford 1954The Student PrinceProfessor Juttner 1952-1954The Ford Television Theatre (TV Series)Red / The Snowman- Come On, Red (1954) ... Red- Heart of Gold (1952) ... The Snowman 1953The BigamistMr. Jordan 1953Mister ScoutmasterDr. Stone 1952Something for the Birds'Admiral' Johnnie Adams 1952Bonzo Goes to CollegeTed 'Pop' Drew 1952Les MiserablesBishop Courbet 1952Sally and Saint AnneGrandpa Pat Ryan 1951Peking ExpressFather Joseph Murray 1950For Heaven's SakeArthur 1950Mister 880William 'Skipper' Miller 1950Pretty BabyCyrus Baxter 1950LouisaMr. Hammond 1950A Woman of DistinctionMark 'J.M.' Middlecott 1949Challenge to LassieJohn Traill 1948Hills of HomeDr. William MacLure 1948Apartment for PeggyProf. Henry Barnes 1947Green Dolphin StreetOctavius Patourel 1947Life with FatherRev. Dr. Lloyd 1947Thunder in the ValleyAdam MacAdam 1947Miracle on 34th StreetKris Kringle 1946UndercurrentProf. David 'Dink' Hamilton 1946Of Human BondageAthelny 1945She Went to the RacesDr. Homer Pecke 1945BewitchedDr. Bergson 1945Dangerous PartnersAlbert Richard Kingby 1944The Keys of the KingdomFather Hamish MacNabb 1944Between Two WorldsScrubby 1943Lassie Come HomeRowlie 1943The Meanest Man in the WorldFrederick P. Leggitt 1943Forever and a DayStubbs 1942A Yank at EtonHeadmaster Justin 1942The Greatest Gift (Short)Bartolomé - the Juggler 1941Charley's AuntStephen Spettigue 1941One Night in LisbonLord Fitzleigh 1941Scotland YardInspector Cork 1941The Devil and Miss JonesHooper 1941Cheers for Miss BishopPresident Corcoran 1940Foreign CorrespondentRowley 1940Pride and PrejudiceMr. Bennet 1940The Doctor Takes a WifeDr. Lionel Sterling 1940Mad Men of EuropeTom Brown 1940The Earl of ChicagoMunsey 1939Cheer Boys CheerEdward Ironside 1938Penny ParadiseJoe Higgins 1938A Yank at OxfordDean of Cardinal 1938Thank You, Mr. Pepys (TV Short)Mr. Samuel Pepys 1938Theatre Parade (TV Series)Pepys- Thank You Mr. Pepys (1938) ... Pepys 1938South RidingAlfred Huggins 1937ParnellCampbell 1936Mad HolidayWilliams 1936All American ChumpJeffrey Crane 1936Anthony AdverseJohn Bonnyfeather 1936Laburnum GroveMr. Radfern 1936The Walking DeadDr. Evan Beaumont 1935Sylvia ScarlettHenry Scarlett 1935The Bishop MisbehavesBishop 1934Spring in the AirFranz 1934Father and SonJohn Bolton 1934The Admiral's SecretAdmiral FitzPorter 1934Java HeadJeremy Ammidon 1934Warn LondonDr. Herman Krauss 1934Passing ShadowsDavid Lawrence 1934Strauss' Great WaltzJohann Strauss, the Elder 1933Friday the ThirteenthMr Wakefield 1933MaroonedTom Roberts 1933Early to BedKruger 1933SmithyJohn Smith 1933Channel CrossingTrotter 1933I Was a SpyBurgomaster 1933For Love or MoneyEdmund Gilbert 1933The Good CompanionsJess Oakroyd 1932Be Mine TonightMayor Pategg 1932Love on WheelsPhilpotts 1932Condemned to DeathBanting 1932Money for NothingSir Henry Blossom 1932Frail WomenThe Bookmaker 1931Hindle WakesChris Hawthorne 1931The Skin GameMr. Hornblower 1931How He Lied to Her Husband (Short)Teddu Bompas 1921The Skin GameHornblower 1920UnmarriedSimm Vandeleur 1916The Real Thing at Last (Short)Rupert K. Thunder / Macbeth

Price: 259.99 USD

Location: Marietta, Georgia

End Time: 2024-01-19T02:00:37.000Z

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