Trivia: At the peak of his career in the early '30s, actor Bela Lugosi was the screen's most notorious personification of evil; the most famous and enduring Dracula, he helped usher in an era of new popularity for the horror genre, only to see his own fame quickly evaporate. Béla Ferenc Dezsõ Blaskó was born in Lugos, Hungary, on October 20, 1882. After seeing a touring repertory company as they passed through town, he became fascinated by acting, and began spending all of his time mounting his own dramatic productions with the aid of other children. Upon the death of his father in 1894, Lugosi apprenticed as a miner, later working on the railroad. His first professional theatrical job was as a chorus boy in an operetta, followed by a stint at the Budapest Academy of Theatrical Arts. By 1901, he was a leading actor with Hungary's Royal National Theatre, and around 1917 began appearing in films (sometimes under the name Arisztid Olt) beginning with A Régiséggyüjtö. Lugosi was also intensely active in politics, and he organized an actors' union following the 1918 collapse of the Hungarian monarchy; however, when the leftist forces were defeated a year later he fled to Germany, where he resumed his prolific film career with 1920's Der Wildtöter und Chingachgook. Lugosi remained in Germany through 1921, when he emigrated to the United States. He made his American film debut in 1923's The Silent Command, but struggled to find further work, cast primarily in exotic bit roles on stage and screen. His grasp of English was virtually non-existent, and he learned his lines phonetically, resulting in an accented, resonant baritone which made his readings among the most distinctive and imitated in performing history. In 1924, Lugosi signed on to direct a drama titled The Right to Dream, but unable to communicate with his cast and crew he was quickly fired; he sued the producers, but was found by the court to be unable to helm a theatrical production and was ordered to pay fines totalling close to 70 dollars. When he refused, the contents of his apartment were auctioned off to pay his court costs -- an inauspicious beginning to his life in America, indeed. Lugosi's future remained grim, but in 1927 he was miraculously cast to play the title character in the Broadway adaptation of the Bram Stoker vampire tale Dracula; reviews were poor, but the production was a hit, and he spent three years in the role. In 1929, Lugosi married a wealthy San Francisco widow named Beatrice Weeks, a union which lasted all of three days; their divorce, which named Clara Bow as the other woman, was a media sensation, and it launched him to national notoriety. After a series of subsequent films, however, Lugosi again faded from view until 1931, when he was tapped to reprise his Dracula portrayal on the big screen. He was Universal executives' last choice for the role -- they wanted Lon Chaney Sr., but he was suffering from cancer -- while director Tod Browning insisted upon casting an unknown. When no other suitable choice arose, however, only Lugosi met with mutual, if grudging, agreement. Much to the shock of all involved, Dracula was a massive hit. Despite considerable studio re-editing, it was moody and atmospheric, and remains among the most influential films in American cinema. Dracula also rocketed Lugosi to international fame, and he was immediately offered the role of the monster in James Whale's Frankenstein; he refused -- in order to attach himself to a picture titled Quasimodo -- and the part instead went to Boris Karloff. The project never went beyond the planning stages, however, and in a sense Lugosi's career never righted itself; he remained a prolific screen presence, but the enduring fame which appeared within his reach was lost forever. Moreover, he was eternally typecast: Throughout the remainder of the decade and well into the 1940s, he appeared in a prolific string of horror films, some good (1932's Island of Lost Souls and 1934's The Black Cat, the latter the first of many collaborations with Karloff), but most of them quite forgettable. Lugosi's choice of projects was indiscriminate at best, and his reputation went into rapid decline; most of his performances were variations on his Dracula role, and before long he slipped into outright parodies of the character in pictures like 1948's Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein, which was to be his last film for four years.As Lugosi's career withered, he became increasingly eccentric, often appearing in public clad in his Dracula costume. He was also the victim of numerous financial problems, and became addicted to drugs. In 1952, he returned from exile to star in Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla, followed later that year by the similarly low-brow My Son, the Vampire and Old Mother Riley Meets the Vampire. By 1953, Lugosi was firmly aligned with the notorious filmmaker Ed Wood, widely recognized as the worst director in movie history; together they made a pair of films -- Glen or Glenda? and Bride of the Monster -- before Lugosi committed himself in 1955 in order to overcome his drug battles. Upon his release, he and Wood began work on the infamous Plan 9 From Outer Space, but after filming only a handful of scenes, Lugosi died of a heart attack on August 15, 1956; he was buried in his Dracula cape. In the decades to come, his stature as a cult figure grew, and in 1994 the noted filmmaker Tim Burton directed the screen biography Ed Wood, casting veteran actor Martin Landau as Lugosi; Landau was brilliant in the role, and won the Oscar which Lugosi himself never came remotely close to earning -- a final irony in a career littered with bittersweet moments.

Trivia: A circus acrobat from the age of eight, Clayton Moore had performed as an aerialist with two circuses and at one World's Fair before turning 20. He became a male model in New York, then struck out for Hollywood in 1938 to seek out acting jobs. He began at the bottom rung as an extra, worked his way up to stunt man, and by 1939 was playing nondescript supporting roles. Alternating between heroes and villains in serials and B-Westerns, Moore didn't strike professional gold until 1949, when he was selected to play the "masked rider of the west" in the TV version of The Lone Ranger. He remained with the series until 1952, when he walked off the show over a salary dispute. His replacement for 26 episodes was John Hart, who had neither the bearing nor the stirring vocal timbre that had distinguished Moore's performances. Briefly returning to serials, Moore was brought back into the Lone Ranger fold in 1954 at a much higher weekly compensation. He stayed with the series until its last episode in 1956, and also starred in two Technicolor Lone Ranger theatrical features. Thereafter, Moore made a good living trading on his Lone Ranger image in TV commercials and personal appearances. In 1978, the Wrather Corporation, which owned the Lone Ranger property and was about to embark on a new feature film based on the character, served Moore with a court order barring him from appearing in public in the Ranger mask and costume. The outpouring of public support and sympathy eventually forced the Wrather people to reverse their decision, but it should be noted that they weren't quite the Scrooges depicted in the press: Throughout the 1970s, Clayton Moore made many appearances as the Lone Ranger without paying the necessary licensing fee to Wrather.

Trivia: Canadian-born general-purpose actor George Pembroke is perhaps best remembered as Dr. Saunders, the leader of the fifth columnists in Bela Lugosi's Black Dragons (1942) and as the police inspector posing as an art connoisseur in the semi-classic Bluebeard (1944). In Hollywood from 1937, Pembroke made serials somewhat of a specialty, appearing in Drums of Fu Manchu (1940), Adventures of Captain Marvel (1941), Perils of Nyoka (1942), Captain Midnight (1942), and Daredevils of the West (1943). He later became a frequent guest star on television's The Lone Ranger and Gene Autry.

Trivia: With his slight built, narrow face and pencil-thin mustache, I. Stanford Jolley did not exactly look trustworthy, and a great many of his screen roles (more than 500) were indeed to be found on the wrong side of the law. Isaac Stanford Jolley had toured as a child with his father's traveling circus and later worked in stock and vaudeville, prior to making his Broadway debut opposite Charles Trowbridge in Sweet Seventeen (1924). Radio work followed and he arrived in Hollywood in 1935. Pegged early on as a gangster or Western outlaw, Jolley graduated to playing lead henchman or the boss villain in the '40s, mostly appearing for such poverty-row companies as Monogram and PRC. Although Jolley is often mentioned as a regular member of the Republic Pictures' stock company, he was never under contract to that legendary studio and only appeared in 25 films for them between 1936 and 1954. From 1950 on, Jolley worked frequently on television and remained a busy performer until at least 1976. According to his widow, the actor, who died of emphysema at the Motion Picture Country Hospital, never earned more than 100 dollars on any given movie assignment. He was the father of art director Stan Jolley.

Trivia: A balding former stage actor from Oregon, Irving Mitchell appeared in scores of films of the 1940s, often playing medical doctors, as in Citizen Kane (1941) and All-American Co-Ed (1941). Mitchell was also one of the suspects in the theft of Napoleon's jewels in Secrets of the Lone Wolf (1941) and one of the two duplicitous industrialists forced by Bela Lugosi to shoot and kill each other in Black Dragons (1942). Very busy in television shows such as Perry Mason and Maverick, Mitchell's last credited feature film was 1957's Jeanne Eagles, in which he played a lawyer.

Trivia: Enjoying a screen career that began in 1908 and lasted until the early '50s, Edward Peil Sr. remains one of those faces every lover of classic Hollywood movies knows so well but just cannot quite place. A barnstormer of the old school, Peil supported legendary stage diva Helena Modjeska in road companies of such theatrical classics as The Witching Hour and Brewster's Millions. Although he had dabbled in motion picture acting as early as 1908 (probably with the Philadelphia-based Lubin company), Peil came into his own with D.W. Griffith, who cast him as Evil Eye in Broken Blossoms (1919) and Swan Way in Dream Street (1921), not exactly characterizations that will endear him to modern, more politically correct moviegoers. Peil, whose last name was often misspelled "Piel," performed more evil-doing later in the decade, although age had a mellowing effect and he increasingly began playing gentleman ranchers, the heroine's father/uncle, decent lawmen, and the like, carving out a whole new career for himself in the field of B-Westerns. According to genre expert Les Adams, Peil made a total of 104 sound Westerns and 11 serials, adding the "Sr." to his name when his namesake son dropped his previous moniker of Johnny Jones. Father and son made one film together: the 1941 aviation drama I Wanted Wings. Edward Peil Sr. died in 1958 at the age of 76.

Trivia: American actor Kenneth Harlan possessed the main prerequisite to succeed as a silent-movie leading man: he looked as though he'd just stepped out of an Arrow Collar ad. The nephew of rolypoly character actor Otis Harlan, Kenneth was on stage from the age of seven. He signed with D.W. Griffith's production company in the mid teens, though he was never actually directed by Griffith. Taking to the Roaring Twenties like a fish to water, Harlan spent as much time partying as he did acting; he also was quite a ladies' man, toting up seven marriages. Harlan's popularity was already on the wane when sound came in, so it didn't really matter that his voice had a surly edge to it which precluded future romantic leading roles. He remained in films as a supporting and bit actor in major features, and as a leading player in serials (Dick Tracy's G-Men [1937]) and short subjects (The Three Stooges' Movie Maniacs [1936]). It was clear that he couldn't muster much enthusiasm for the roles assigned him in the '30s; whenever appearing as a western villain, Harlan seldom bothered to dress the part, generally showing up on the set with a stetson hat and a modern business suit. Kenneth Harlan left acting in 1944 to become a reasonably successful actor's agent and restauranteur.

Trivia: Of Jewish-Swiss descent, actor Bernard Gorcey was in his early 20s when he emigrated to the U.S. At 4' 10", Gorcey ruled out the possibility of becoming a leading man on stage; instead, he concentrated on comedy roles, and in so doing assured himself nearly five decades of steady work. On Broadway and in stock, he provided comedy relief to such operettas as Rose Marie, Wildflower, and Song of the Flame. In 1922, he was cast as Isaac Cohen in the phenomenally popular Broadway play Abie's Irish Rose; six year later, he repeated his role in the film version. Then it was back to Broadway and radio work until 1939, when Charlie Chaplin hired Gorcey to play philosophical ghetto dweller Mr. Mann in The Great Dictator. Gorcey went on to play minor roles at Warner Bros. and Monogram, where his son, actor Leo Gorcey was firmly established as a member of the "Dead End Kids" and "East Side Kids" aggregations. After another sojourn to Broadway, the elder Gorcey returned to Monogram, this time to stay. In 1946, the "East Side Kids" matriculated into "The Bowery Boys," a series that lasted until 1958. In the first Bowery Boys entry Live Wires, Gorcey played a featured role as a nervous bookie. From Bowery Bombshell (1946) onward, he was ensconced in the role of Louie Dumbrowski, the eternally flustered, supremely gullible owner of the sweet shop where the Bowery Boys whiled away their time hatching schemes and mooching sodas. Occasionally, Gorcey would accept an "outside" role in films like No Minor Vices, but his principal source of income remained Louie Dumbrowski (and the Los Angeles print shop that he ran in his off-hours). Not long after appearing in the 1955 Bowery Boys opus Dig That Uranium, Bernard Gorcey died of injuries sustained in a traffic accident.

Trivia: Character actor Frank Melton was under contract at Fox Studios from 1933 until the early 1940s. Apparently a favorite of humorist Will Rogers, Melton was prominently cast in six of Rogers' movie vehicles. In other films, he could usually be found in bit roles, often playing displaced Southerners in the Big City. Before his retirement in 1944, Frank Melton free-lanced at Columbia and Warner Bros.