Lee Patrick was an American actress whose career began in 1922 on the New York stage with her role in The Bunch and Judy which headlined Adele Astaire and featured Adele's brother Fred Astaire.
Wallace Ford was an English-born naturalized American vaudevillian, stage performer and screen actor. Usually playing wise-cracking characters, he combined a tough but friendly-faced demeanor with a small but powerful, stocky physique.
Patsy Kelly was an American actress. She is known for her role as the brash, wisecracking sidekick to Thelma Todd in a series of short comedy films produced by Hal Roach in the 1930s. Kelly's career continued in similar roles after Todd's death in 1935.
Margaret De Wolfe Wycherly was an English stage and film actress. She spent many years in the United States and is best remembered for her Broadway roles and Hollywood character parts. On screen she played mother to Gary Cooper and James Cagney.
Ursula Jean McMinn, better known as Ursula Jeans, was an English film, stage, and television actress.
William Harrigan was an American actor who performed in Hollywood during the 1930s and 1940s and on stage.
The Gorilla is a three-act play written by Ralph Spence. Donald Gallaher produced it on Broadway, where it opened at the Selwyn Theatre on April 28, 1925. The play was a success and ran on Broadway for 257 performances. A production opened in London at the New Oxford Theatre on June 30, 1925, and ran for 134 performances. The play was a parody of popular theatrical mysteries such as The Bat and The Cat and the Canary. Its advertisements claimed it "outbats The Bat".
Hiram Sherman was an American actor.
Frederick J. Jackson, also known professionally as Fred Jackson and Frederick Jackson and under the pseudonym Victor Thorne, was an American author, playwright, screenwriter, novelist, and producer for both stage and film. A prolific writer of short stories and serialized novels, most of his non-theatre works were published in pulp magazines such as Detective Story Magazine and Argosy. Many of these stories were adapted into films by other writers.
The Thirteenth Chair is a 1929 American mystery film directed by Tod Browning. The picture is based on a 1916 play of the same name by Bayard Veiller. It stars Conrad Nagel, Leila Hyams and Margaret Wycherly.
King Donovan was an American film, stage, and television actor, as well as a film and television director.
The 48th Street Theatre was a Broadway theatre at 157 West 48th Street in Manhattan. It was built by longtime Broadway producer William A. Brady and designed by architect William Albert Swasey. The venue was also called the Equity 48th Street Theatre (1922–25) and the Windsor Theatre (1937–43).
The Bat is a three-act play by Mary Roberts Rinehart and Avery Hopwood that was first produced by Lincoln Wagenhals and Collin Kemper in 1920. The story combines elements of mystery and comedy as Cornelia Van Gorder and guests spend a stormy night at her rented summer home, searching for stolen money they believe is hidden in the house, while they are stalked by a masked criminal known as "the Bat". The Bat's identity is revealed at the end of the final act.
Robert North was an American vaudeville performer who became a success as a stand-up comedian. Later he became a prolific motion picture producer.
The Ticket-of-Leave Man is an 1863 stage melodrama in four acts by the British writer Tom Taylor, based on a French drama, Le Retour de Melun. It takes its name from the Ticket of Leave issued to convicts when they were released from jail on parole. A recently returned convict is blackmailed by another man into committing a robbery, but is rescued thanks to the intervention of a detective. It has been described as apparently being the first play to give a truly significant role to a detective.
Helen Lowell, born Helen Lowell Robb (1866–1937), was an American stage and film actress.
The Barton Mystery is a 1916 play by the Anglo-American writer Walter C. Hackett. It was first performed at the Savoy Theatre in London, lasting for 165 performances. Its run in New York the following year was less successful and it closed after just twenty shows. The play mixes elements of a whodunit detective mystery with farce.
The Outsider is a play by the British writer Dorothy Brandon. It portrays the struggle of an unorthodox medical practitioner to gain acceptance by the medical establishment. It was subsequently revised to show the unconventional triumphing over the conventional, whereas the play had originally had the opposite ending.
Espionage is a 1935 play by the British-American writer Walter C. Hackett. It is a thriller set on the Orient Express, written as a vehicle for Hackett's wife Marion Lorne. It revolves around a plot to assassinate a munitions tycoon.
Out of Bounds is a comedy thriller play by the British writer Arthur Watkyn. It enjoyed a successful run at Wyndham's Theatre in the West End with Michael Redgrave in the lead role of Lancelot Dodd, a naive headmaster who is an exact Doppelgänger of a British spy who has recently died. The West End cast also included Pauline Jameson, Anton Diffring, Graham Armitage, Peter Stephens, Michael Balfour, Michael Bates, Lionel Gamlin and Charles Heslop. It was directed by Harold French.
