Author: Peter J Patrick

Born July 22, 1955 in Appleton, Wisconsin, William J, Dafoe was one of eight children whose parents were a surgeon and a nurse who worked together constantly, leaving the future actor to be raised by his five older sisters. He became known as “Willem”, the Dutch name for “William”, while in high school. Dafoe studied…

Born July 18, 1911 in London, Ontario, Canada, Hume Cronyn was one of five children whose father, Hume Sr. was a businessman and member of Parliament for London who had an observatory at the University of Western Ontario and an asteroid named after him. After graduating from Ridley College, Cronyn switched majors from pre-law to…

Born October 31, 1896 in Chester, Pennsylvania as the result of the rape of her 15-year-mother Louise Anderson by her 18-year-old father, pianist John Waters, Ethel Waters was raised in poverty by her grandmother, Sally Anderson who worked as a housemaid, along with two aunts and an uncle, her mother having married another man shortly…

Born June 11, 1919 in Dublin, Ireland, Richard Andrew Palethorpe-Todd was the son of Andrew William Palethorpe Todd, an an international Irish rugby player who gained three caps for his country before becoming a British Army physician. Todd spent much of his early years in India where his father was stationed. The family later moved…

Born October 1, 1935 in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, England as Julia Elizabeth Wells, the internationally acclaimed superstar known professionally as Julie Andrews took the last name of her stepfather (Ted Andrews) when her mother remarried in 1944. Andrews began performing at early age with her mother and stepfather who were both music hall performers. Just after…

Born February 28, 1894 in New York City, Ben Hecht was the son of Russian Jewish immigrants. At ten, he was considered a child prodigy on his way to becoming a violin virtuoso but at 12 he became an acrobat in the circus. The family moved to Racine, Wisconsin where Hecht attended high school. He…

Born December 19, 1902 in Cheltenham, England, Ralph Richardson’s parents were eccentric artists. When he was four, his parents got into a row over the wallpaper his mother had chosen for his father’s study. His mother left his two older brothers with their devout Quaker father who raised them in his religion and took Ralph…

Film history is full of wonderful characters played by actors and actresses, some of whom were in countless films without making on a mark and then suddenly burst into our collective consciousness with one special performance from which they built successful careers, while others came and went with just that one unforgettable performance. Before 1936,…