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The basics

Quick Facts

Intro
German-American actor
Gender
Male
Place of birth
Berlin, Margraviate of Brandenburg
Place of death
Woodland Hills, USA
Age
75 years
The details (from wikipedia)

Biography

Max Davidson (May 23, 1875 – September 4, 1950) was a German film actor known for his comedic Jewish persona during the silent film era. With a career spanning over thirty years, Davidson appeared in over 180 films.

Career

Born in Berlin, Davidson emigrated to the United States in the 1890s where he began working in stock theater and vaudeville. He entered silent movies in 1912. He made a series of films featuring the character Izzy for Reliance Pictures Company in 1914. The films included Izzy Gets the Wrong Bottle, Izzy and His Rival, Izzy and the Diamond, How Izzy Stuck to His Post, How Izzy Was Saved, Izzy, the Detective, Izzy's Night Out, Izzy, the Operator, and Izzy and the Bandit.

By the mid-teens, Davidson had appeared in his first feature film, Edward Dillon's Don Quixote (1915), followed by D.W. Griffith's Intolerance, and Tod Browning's Puppets (both 1916).

In the 1920s, he began working for Hal Roach, appearing in numerous two-reeler comedies including Call of the Cuckoo with Charley Chase, Get 'Em Young with Stan Laurel, and Why Girls Say No and Love 'Em and Feed 'Em with Oliver Hardy, as well as the early talkie Our Gang short Moan and Groan, Inc. (1929), as the crazy old man who haunts a house. He starred alongside a young Jackie Coogan in a pair of silent features, The Rag Man (1923) and Old Clothes (1925).

In 1923, he appeared in the Mack Sennett feature The Extra Girl with Mabel Normand, and in 1927 made a rare starring feature at Columbia, Pleasure Before Business, as well as playing a somewhat more serious role as a servant in the Pola Negri WW1 vehicle Hotel Imperial. He also received the colorization treatment as an irate shopkeeper in the Three Stooges film No Census, No Feeling (1940).

His 1928 short Pass the Gravy was deemed "culturally significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.

Later career and death

Davidson made the transition to sound film, but ended his career by playing mostly uncredited roles. He made his final screen appearance in the 1945 Clark Gable film Adventure. Davidson died on September 4, 1950 in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California.

Partial filmography

YearTitleRoleNotes
1913Scenting a Terrible CrimeThe Superintendent
1914An Interrupted SéanceLandlord
1915Caught by the HandleMr. Riche
1916Sunshine DadMystic Seer
1916IntoleranceNeighbor
1916The Heiress at Coffee Dan'sShorty Olson
1917A Daughter of the PoorJoe EastmanAlternative titles: The Heart of the Poor
The Spitfire
1917The Scrub LadyMax and Marie Dressler in the film
1918The Hun WithinMax
1919The HoodlumAbram Isaacs
1919The Mother and the LawThe Kindly Neighbor
1921No Woman KnowsFerdinand Brandeis
1921The Idle RichThe tailor
1922Second Hand RoseAbe Rosenstein
1922Turn to the RightPawnbroker
1922RemembranceGeorges Cartier
1922The Right That FailedMichael Callahan
1923The Ghost PatrolRapushkin
1923The RendezvousCommissar
1923The Darling of New YorkSolomon Levinsky
1924Fools HighwayOld Levi
1924Hold Your BreathStreet Merchant
1925The Rag ManMax Ginsburg
1925Old ClothesMax Ginsburg
1925Justice of the Far NorthIzzy Hawkins
1925Hogan's AlleyClothier
1926Raggedy RoseMoe Ginsberg
1927Hotel ImperialElias Butterman
1927Why Girls Say NoPapa Whisselberg
1927Pleasure Before BusinessSam Weinberg
1927Jewish PrudencePapa Gimplewart
1927Don't Tell Everything
1927Should Second Husbands Come First?
1927Flaming Fathers
1927Call of the CuckooPapa Grimplewart
1927Love 'Em and Feed 'Em
1928The Boy FriendPapa Davidson
1928Feed 'Em and WeepMax, restaurant manager
1928Pass the GravyThe fatherNational Film Registry
1928Dumb Daddies
1928Came the Dawn
1929So This Is CollegeMoe Levine, the tailor
1929Moan and Groan, Inc.The lunatic
1929Hurdy Gurdy
1930The ShrimpProfessor Schoenheimer
1931The Itching Hour
1931Oh! Oh! CleopatraRoyal musician
1932Docks of San FranciscoMax, Detective
1933The Cohens and Kellys in TroubleLarsenUncredited
1934Straight Is the WayOld clothes manUncredited
1935MetropolitanTailorUncredited
1936Roamin' WildAbe Wineman
1937The Girl Said NoMaxAlternative title: With Words and Music
1939The Great CommandmentOld man
1940The Great DictatorJewish manUncredited
1940Kitty Foyle: The Natural History of a WomanFlower manUncredited
1940No Census, No FeelingStorekeeperUncredited
1942Reap the Wild WindJurorUncredited
1945AdventureMan in libraryUncredited
The contents of this page are sourced from Wikipedia article. The contents are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license.
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