
Cast
Acting
Cast
Known for
Acting
Born
1880-01-29
From
Darby, Pennsylvania, USA
Died
1946-12-25
Also known as William Claude Dukenfield, Bill Fields, Charles Bogle
William Claude Dukenfield was the eldest of five children born to Cockney immigrant James Dukenfield and Philadelphia native Kate Felton. He went to school for four years, then quit to work with his father selling vegetables from a horse cart. At eleven, after many fights with his alcoholic father (who hit him on the head with a shovel), he ran away from home. For a while he lived in a hole in the ground, depending on stolen food and clothing. He was often beaten and spent nights in jail. His first regular job was delivering ice. By age thirteen he was a skilled pool player and juggler. It was then, at an amusement park in Norristown PA, that he was first hired as an entertainer. There he developed the technique of pretending to lose the things he was juggling. In 1893 he was employed as a juggler at Fortescue's Pier, Atlantic City. When business was slow he pretended to drown in the ocean (management thought his fake rescue would draw customers). By nineteen he was billed as "The Distinguished Comedian" and began opening bank accounts in every city he played. At age twenty-three he opened at the Palace in London and played with Sarah Bernhardt at Buckingham Palace. He starred at the Folies-Bergere (young Charles Chaplin and Maurice Chevalier were on the program). He was in each of the Ziegfeld Follies from 1915 through 1921. He played for a year in the highly praised musical "Poppy" which opened in New York in 1923. In 1925 D.W. Griffith made a movie of the play, renamed Sally of the Sawdust (1925), starring Fields. Pool Sharks (1915), Fields' first movie, was made when he was thirty-five. He settled into a mansion near Burbank, California and made most of his thirty-seven movies for Paramount. He appeared in mostly spontaneous dialogs on Charlie McCarthy's radio shows. In 1939 he switched to Universal where he made films written mainly by and for himself. He died after several serious illnesses, including bouts of pneumonia.

as Self (archive footage)

as Self (archive footage)

as W.C. Fields

as Self

as Sam Bisbee

as Humpty-Dumpty

as Sheriff John Hoxley

as Self - Tribute Montage (archive footage)

as (archive footage)

as (archive footage)

as Self (archive footage) (uncredited)

as Wilkins Micawber

as Augustus Winterbottom

as Bela Toerrek

as Self (archive footage)


as Professor Pufflewhistle (uncredited)

as W. C. Fields

as Cuthbert J. Twillie

as Self (archive footage)

as Rollo La Rue

as T. Frothingill Bellows / S.B. Bellows

as J. Effingham Bellweather

as Egbert SousΓ©

as Commodore Jackson

as (archive footage)

as Ambrose Wolfinger

as Wilkins Micawber in 'David Copperfield' (archive footage)

as Samuel Bisbee

as Self (archive footage)

as Professor Royle

as Mr. Snavely

as Self

as The President

as The Great McGonigle / Squire Cribbs in 'The Drunkard'

as Self (archive footage)

as Dentist

as Self (archive footage)


as (archive footage)

as Self (archive footage)

as Eustace McGargle

as Harold Bissonette

as Cornelius O'Hare

as Professor Quail

as W.C. Fields

as Mr. Stubbins

as (archive footage)


as Elmer Finch

as Elmer Prettywillie

as Self

as Larson E. Whipsnade

as Mr. Dilweg

as A British Sergeant

as (archive footage)

as The Great Man

as Richard Whitehead

as Pa Potter

as Professor Eustance McGargle

as Ring Master

as Himself

as Gabby Gilfoil