inktober 2024: series 2 week 4

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The second series — “Horror Actors of the 1940s” — concludes with George Zucco.

British actor George Zucco gained fame as an upper-crust, but often villainous, character in dozens of dramas, mysteries and serials of the 30s and 40s. He was cast as the nefarious “Professor Moriarty” in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes in 1939. He later appeared in Bulldog Drummond, The Thin Man and Charlie Chan features.

In the 1940s, George appeared in supporting roles in a number of Universal B-pictures in the horror genre, including The Mummy’s Hand, The Mummy’s Tomb, The Mad Ghoul, The Mummy’s Ghost and House of Frankenstein. In The Mad Monster, George played a typical mad scientist experimenting in areas better left alone. In 1939, he returned to the Sherlock Holmes franchise, playing opposite Basil Rathbone in Sherlock Holmes in Washington.

After a small role in 1951’s David and Bathsheba — George’s 99th film — he suffered a stroke, causing his role in the upcoming The Desert Fox to be recast. The stroke brought on dementia and George never recovered. He died at a Hollywood nursing facility in 1960 at the age of 74.

 

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