Willis Palmer Sweatnam, Sr. (1854 - November 25, 1930) was a Broadway show actor and minstrel show performer. [1]
He was born in Zanesville, Ohio, in 1854. He had a son, Willis Palmer Sweatnam, Jr. (1887-?)
When down on his luck in 1903, George Ade created a blackface role for Sweatnam in his new play The County Chairman , and Sweatnam proved to be one of the stars of the show. [2]
He died on November 25, 1930, at the Lambs Club. [3]
Walter Bruce Willis is an American retired actor. He achieved fame with a leading role on the comedy-drama series Moonlighting (1985–1989) and has appeared in over a hundred films, gaining recognition as an action hero for his portrayal of John McClane in the Die Hard franchise (1988–2013).
Franklin Edward Cover was an American actor best known for starring in the sitcom The Jeffersons. His character, Tom Willis, was half of one of the first interracial marriages to be seen on prime-time television.
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Fred Andrew Stone was an American actor. Stone began his career as a performer in circuses and minstrel shows, went on to act in vaudeville, and became a star on Broadway and in feature films, which earned him a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
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Donald Moffat was a British–American actor with a decades-long career in film and stage in the United States. He began his acting career on- and off-Broadway, which included appearances in The Wild Duck and Right You Are If You Think You Are, earning Tony Award nominations for both, as well as Painting Churches, for which he received an Obie Award. Moffat also appeared in several feature films, including The Thing (1982), The Right Stuff (1983) and, in a rare leading role on film, as a tenuously-recovering alcoholic in On the Nickel (1980). Moffat also made guest appearances in numerous television series, including such shows as Little House on the Prairie, Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, and The West Wing. He also was a principal in the 1993 TV miniseries Tales of the City.
Francis Wilson was an American actor and founding president of the Actors' Equity Association.
William Courtright was an American film actor.
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George Walker was an American vaudevillian, actor, and producer. In 1893, in San Francisco, Walker at the age of 20 met Bert Williams, who was a year younger. The two young men became performing partners. Walker and Williams appeared in The Gold Bug (1895), Clorindy (1898), The Policy Player (1899), Sons of Ham (1900), In Dahomey (1903), Abyssinia (1906), and Bandanna Land (1907). Walker married dancer Ada Overton, who later also was a choreographer.
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Nathaniel D. Mann (1866–1915) was an American composer best known for his work with L. Frank Baum. He composed at least two songs with Baum, "Different Ways of Making Love" and "It Happens Ev'ry Day," and another with John Slavin, "She Didn't Really Mind the Thing at All," for The Wizard of Oz stage musical in 1902, and in 1908, composed the first original film score for The Fairylogue and Radio-Plays, one of the earliest feature-length fiction films, which debuted September 24, 1908. With Baum, he also composed the musical The King of Gee-Whiz, which went through various titles such as Montezuma, King Jonah XIII, and The Son of the Sun (1905). This was collaboration with and based on a novel by Emerson Hough, which was never completed and the extant scenario published in 1969.
Joseph Bridger Cawthorn was an American stage and film comic actor.
The County Chairman is a 1903 comedy play by George Ade, which was one of his greatest successes. Produced by Henry W. Savage, it played for 222 performances on Broadway at Wallack's Theatre. It was also adapted to film in 1914 and 1935.
The College Widow is a 1904 American comedic play by George Ade, which was adapted to film multiple times, and also into the popular 1917 musical Leave It to Jane.
The Earl Carroll Vanities was a Broadway revue presented by Earl Carroll in the 1920s and early 1930s. Carroll and his show were sometimes controversial.