Cast

Harry 'Snub' Pollard

Acting

Cast

Harry 'Snub' Pollard

Known for

Acting

Born

1889-11-08

From

Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

Died

1962-01-19

Also known as Harry 'Snub' Pollard, Harry Pollard, Snub Pollard

Biography

Snub Pollard (9 November 1889 – 19 January 1962) was an Australian-born vaudevillian, who became a silent film comedian in Hollywood, popular in the 1920s. Born Harold Fraser, in Melbourne, Australia on 9 November 1889, he began performing with Pollard's Lilliputian Opera Company at a young age. Like many of the actors in the popular juvenile company, he adopted Pollard as his stage name. The company ran several highly successful professional children's troupes that traveled Australia and New Zealand in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. In 1908, Harry Pollard joined the company tour to North America. After the completion of the tour, he returned to the US. By 1915 he was regularly appearing in uncredited roles in movies, for example Charles Epting notes that Pollard can clearly be seen in Chaplin's 1915 short By the Sea. In later years, Pollard claimed Hal Roach had discovered him while he was performing on stage in Los Angeles. Pollard played supporting roles in the early films of Harold Lloyd and Bebe Daniels. The long-faced Pollard sported a Kaiser Wilhelm mustache turned upside-down; this became his trademark. Lloyd's producer, Hal Roach, gave Pollard his own starring series of one- and two-reel shorts. The most famous is 1923's It's a Gift, in which he plays an inventor of many Rube Goldberg-like contraptions, including a car that runs by magnet power. In early 1923, shortly after his second marriage, Pollard returned with his wife Elizabeth to see his relations in Australia. His visit attracted considerable attention, and he appeared again in several theatres to speak about the motion picture business. On his return to the US, he left Roach and joined the low-budget Weiss Brothers studio in 1926. There he co-starred with Marvin Loback as a poor man's version of Laurel and Hardy, copying that team's plots and gags. In later years, Pollard claimed the Great Depression wiped out his investments, and he had been unable to "adjust to the talkies." However, in the 1930s, he played small parts in talking comedies, and was featured as comic relief in "B" westerns. Pollard's silent-comedy credentials guaranteed him work in slapstick revivals. He appeared with other film veterans in Hollywood Cavalcade (1939), The Perils of Pauline (1947), and Man of a Thousand Faces (1957). He also appeared regularly as a supporting player in Columbia Pictures' two-reel comedies of the mid-1940s. Forsaking his familiar mustache in his later years, he landed much steadier work in films as a mostly uncredited bit player. He played incidental roles in scores of Hollywood features and shorts, almost always as a mousy, nondescript fellow, usually with no dialogue. Snub Pollard died of cancer on 19 January 1962, aged 72, after nearly 50 years in the movie business. His interment was at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills). For his contributions to motion pictures, Pollard has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6415½ Hollywood Boulevard.

Harry 'Snub' Pollard

Harry 'Snub' Pollard

Biography

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

Singin' in the Rain

Miracle on 34th Street

High Rollers

His Regeneration

Red River

Si, Senor

Monkey Businessmen

Ask Father

Cockeyed Cavaliers

Inherit the Wind

Limelight

Friendly Persuasion

Pocketful of Miracles

Julius Caesar

Phony Express

One-Eyed Jacks

Society Mugs

Strange Impersonation

Two Scrambled

Till the Clouds Roll By

Soft Money

Fifteen Minutes

Scaramouche

Spring Fever

Fresh Paint

Where the Sidewalk Ends

Double Trouble

The Tin Star

Mesquite Buckaroo

365 Days

Stingaree

Homicidal

Slippery Slickers

House of Strangers

Do Me a Favor

The Man with the Golden Arm

Swing Your Partners

The Paradine Case

Fire!!

Casanova Brown

Strictly Modern

Kicked Out

The Lady Gambles

The Gunfighter

The Mystery Man

Canyon Passage

All Wet

Adam's Rib

Get Busy

Defective Detectives

Swat the Crook

Mr. Celebrity

Here Comes a Sailor

The Man from Colorado

Luke's Lost Lamb

Pipe Down

Master of the World

Living It Up

Sister Kenny

Edge of Darkness

The Old Sea Dog

The Buster Keaton Story

The Country Girl

Johnny Belinda

The Parrott Chase

Lonesome Luke Leans to the Literary

Call a Taxi!

Goofs and Saddles

Before Breakfast

Stars in My Crown

The Purchase Price

Birds of a Feather

Hail the Conquering Hero

The Company She Keeps

Where the Buffalo Roam

Bughouse Bellhops