Robert Barrat

Robert Harriot Barrat (July 10, 1889 – January 7, 1970) was an American stage, motion picture, and television character actor.

Career

Born in New York City, Barrat made his theatrical debut in a stock company in Springfield, Massachusetts. He later acted on Broadway, where his credits include Lilly Turner (1932), Bulls, Bears and Asses (1931), This Is New York (1930), Judas (1928), The Lady Lies (1928), A Lady for a Night (1927), Marco Millions (1927), Chicago (1926), Kid Boots (1923), The Breaking Point (1923), The Unwritten Chapter (1920), The Crimson Alibi (1919), The Invisible Foe (1918), and Some One in the House (1918).

He appeared in 150 films, according to IMDb, in a Hollywood career that lasted four decades. He appeared in seven pictures with James Cagney during the 1930s. Two of his most noted roles were as the murder victim Archer Coe in Michael Curtiz's The Kennel Murder Case (1933) and as the treacherous Major Ferdinand Walsin Esterhazy in the 1937 Academy Award winning film The Life of Emile Zola. He played several other historical characters as well, among them Davy Crockett in Man of Conquest, Zachary Taylor in Distant Drums, Abraham Lincoln in Trailin' West, Cornelius Van Horne in Canadian Pacific and General Douglas MacArthur twice, in They Were Expendable and American Guerrilla in the Philippines. He also appeared with the Marx Brothers in Go West (1940).

By 1954, he had turned to television roles. His final acting appearance was in an episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour in 1964.

Death

He died of a heart ailment in Hollywood in 1970, aged 80. He was survived by his wife, Mary Dean. He was buried at Green Hill Cemetery, Martinsburg, West Virginia.

Complete filmography