Carlyle Blackwell

Carlyle Blackwell (January 20, 1884 – June 17, 1955) was an American silent film actor, director and producer.

Early years

Blackwell was born in Troy, Pennsylvania. He studied at Cornell University before J. Stewart Blackton discovered him and turned his interest to acting.

Career

He made his film debut in the 1910 Vitagraph Studios production of Uncle Tom's Cabin directed by J. Stuart Blackton. Between then and 1930, when talkies ended his acting career, he appeared in more than 180 films. For his contributions to the film industry, Blackwell has a motion pictures star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6340 Hollywood Boulevard. In his later years he was also active as a producer and writer. After his final film in 1930, Blackwell turned to performing on stage in live theatre.

Personal life and death

On July 8, 1909, he married Ruth Hartman. In 1923, he divorced Hartman. On July 19, 1926, in London, he married Leah Barnato. In 1933, he and Barnato divorced, and he married Avonne Taylor. In 1934, the couple purchased a farmhouse estate in Brookfield, Connecticut. They were divorced in 1936. He later was married to Nancy Nichelson Bradsby, widow of Hillerich & Bradsby baseball bat executive Frank Bradsby, until her death in 1947. In 1948 he married Ann Enoch, and they were still wed when he died.

On June 17, 1955, Blackwell died in Miami, aged 71.

Filmography

Partial filmography

Uncle Tom's Cabin (1910)
On Her Doorsteps (1910)
Doctor Cupid (1911)
Slim Jim's Last Chance (1911)
The Wasp (1911)
Over the Garden Wall (1911)
The Blackfoot Halfbreed (1911)
The Temptation of Rodney Vane (1911)
Norma from Norway (1911)
The Gun Smugglers (1912)
The Invisible Foe (1913)
The Ocean Waif (1916)
A Woman's Way (1916)
The Crimson Dove (1917)
The Page Mystery (1917)
The Marriage Market (1917)
The Good for Nothing (1917)
The Burglar (1917)
The Social Leper (1917)
Youth (1917)
His Brother's Wife (1916)
Stolen Orders (1918)
The Golden Wall (1918)
The Beloved Blackmailer (1918)
By Hook or Crook (1918)
The Road to France (1918)
Hitting the Trail (1918)
Courage for Two (1919)
Love in a Hurry (1919)
Three Green Eyes (1919)
The Rolling Road (1928 )

As a director

Chasing the Smuggler (1914) - his first movie as a director
The Man Who Could Not Lose (1914)
The Good for Nothing (1917)
Leap to Fame (1918)
His Royal Highness (1918)
Beyond the Cities (1930)
Bedrock (1930)

His work in England

Carlyle Blackwell went to England in 1921 and played the first Bulldog Drummond in film, in a movie called Bulldog Drummond (1922).

On Page 18, Chapter 2, in ' A Notable Woman ', ( Canongate Books, 2015 ), the English Diarist, Jean Lucey Pratt, is quoted as having seen Blackwell filming : Saturday, Sept. 11th., 1927 : " On the rocks, just below the Mullion Hotel...we discovered ...he is Carlyle Blackwell ". He was filming ' The Rolling Road '.

He stayed and worked in England until 1931, both in the theater and in movies.

His cinematic works in England include:
- The Virgin Queen (1923)
- Shadow of Egypt (1924)
- She (1925)
- Monte Carlo (1925)
- The Rolling Road (1928)
- The Wrecker (1929)
- Der Hund von Baskerville (1929)
his only talkies:
- Bedrock (1930)
- Beyond the Cities (1930)