| Noah Beery | |
| Birthname: | Noah Nicholas Beery |
| Birth Date: | 17 January 1882 |
| Birth Place: | Kansas City, Missouri |
| Death Place: | Beverly Hills, California |
| Occupation: | Actor |
| Spouse: | Marguerite Lindsay (1910-1946) |
Noah Beery (January 17 1882 – April 1 1946) was a popular American actor from the 1920s to the 1940s.
Beery was born Noah Nicholas Beery in Kansas City, Missouri. He and his brothers William C. Beery (1879-1949) and the legendary Wallace Beery all became Hollywood actors. The Beery brothers were the children of Noah Webster Beery and his wife Frances Margaret Fitzgerald, which made them full brothers (contrary to many sources).[1]
Noah Beery started in the theatre in 1898, at the age of sixteen. By 1905 he was appearing on Broadway. After a dozen years on the stage, he joined his brother in Hollywood in 1915 to make motion pictures. He became a respected character actor, adept at playing the villain. One of his most memorable characterizations was as Sergeant Gonzales in The Mark of Zorro (1920) opposite Douglas Fairbanks. The tagline on the poster for 1923's Stormswept proclaimed Wallace and Noah Beery, The Two Greatest Character Actors on the American Screen.
Beery acted through the silent film era (giving a fine performance as Sgt. Lejaune in the 1926 Beau Geste), and successfully made the transition to "talkies". He had a pleasant singing voice and he appeared in lavish early Technicolor musicals, such as The Show of Shows (1929), Song of the Flame (1930), Bright Lights (1930), Under A Texas Moon (1930) and Golden Dawn (1930), (in which he wore blackface makeup as an African native). He reached his peak in popularity in 1930, even recording a phonograph record for Brunswick Records with songs from two of his films. Like his brother Wallace, he had an amazingly powerful and distinctive voice. While he had a long and memorable career, his popularity gradually declined, while his brother Wallace became the highest paid actor in the world, winning an Oscar).
Noah Beery appeared in nearly two hundred films. In 1945 he returned to New York City to star in the Mike Todd Broadway production of "Up in Central Park."
Beery died in 1946 (on his brother Wallace's birthday) in Beverly Hills of a heart attack. He was buried at Forest Lawn - Hollywood Hills Cemetery in Los Angeles.
Noah Beery's son, Noah Beery, Jr., also became an extremely successful character actor with a career spanning several decades. He appeared as "Rocky," the father of James Garner's character in the television series The Rockford Files (1974-1980).
At the height of his career, Noah Beery began billing himself as "Noah Beery, Sr." in anticipation of his son's presence in films. After his death, his son dropped the "Junior" and became simply Noah Beery.