LLeff wrote:Hi folks,
* The inevitable Hans Conreid
Sorry I missed the chat, Laura. I had to cover a five-hour ballgame.
This is for Kay:
TODAY'S GRAB BAG
By LILIAN CAMPBELL
[Hagerstown Morning Herald, July 12, 1948]
Radio's Hans Conreid, who averages 10 programs a week, in as many different impersonations, once had a job working as a punching bag demonstrator in a Hollywood department store, but the theater has always been his first love, inherited from his father who was a Viennese actor.
Born in Baltimore. Hans attended Columbia university where he played with a repertory theater in Shakespearean roles. He broke into radio through his excellence in the Shakespearean theater. Hans served in World War II on the United States Army Tank Corps, and after the war, helped get up three radio stations on Tokyo and Korea. He lives near the U. C. L. A. campus with his wife, three dogs and five Siamese cats.
Looking — and — Listening
BY THOMAS D. COOLICAM
Syracuse Herald Journal [April 24, 1950]
IT WOULD TAKE nothing short of a sensational makeup artist to make Hans Conreid begin to look like Professor Kropotkin, the character he so masterfully plays on the My Friend Irma show.
Actually, he is thirtyish and about 6 feet, two inches tall, but looks taller.
Gangling in appearance but graceful in motion, he needs only the top hat and cape to look like the Shakespearean actor of another era.
His resonant, flexible voice and flair lor dramatic display have made him successful in a variety of radio and screen roles, including those of a pompous German, near-sighted, low-comedy Czechs, and frustrated Viennese psychiatrists.
* *
PROFESSOR KROPOTKIN, the Balkanese boarder of Mrs. O'Reilly in the My Friend Irma series is, in a sense, the most difficult to play for someone like Conreid, who could blast the tenants of the last row with a roar and sweep the front row with a grand gesture.
However Conreid has mastered the role. The professor's voice is soft, his manner self-deprecating and his gags are throwaways.
It is amusing to see the look of surprise registered on the faces of the studio audience when they are first introduced to Conreid as the creator of the hapless gypsy violinist.
Yhtapmys
Posted: Sun Jul 13, 2008 1:56 pm