Paul Stewart

About Paul Stewart

Who is it?: Actor, Director, Producer
Birth Day: March 13, 1908
Birth Place:  New York City, New York, United States
Died On: February 17, 1986(1986-02-17) (aged 77)\nLos Angeles, California, U.S.
Birth Sign: Aries
Cause of death: Heart failure
Alma mater: Columbia University
Occupation: Actor director producer
Years active: 1930–1985
Spouse(s): Peg LaCentra (married 1939–1986; his death)

Paul Stewart Net Worth

Paul Stewart was born on March 13, 1908 in  New York City, New York, United States, is Actor, Director, Producer. Esteemed character actor Paul Stewart had a pair of the coldest orbs in town and made his living for decades playing dark, callous, shiftless villains, including a vast number of mobsters. Not a well-known name per se, he was nevertheless a reliable actor who seemed to have been born for the film noir and gangland crime drama genre with his premature silvery hair, dark thick brows and probing, deep-set eyes, all accentuated by a tough and penetrating Brooklyn accent.Born in New York City on March 13, 1908, Stewart developed an interest for acting in his teens, making his Broadway debut with "Two Seconds" in 1931, following graduation from Columbia University. He had played a few more stage roles in New York when he met and made an impression on Orson Welles. As a result he became a founding member of the Mercury Theatre and a founding member of AFTRA when it was just a radio union. Stewart's tough, guttural voice became a familiar sound on the 1930s airwaves and he was among the cast in the infamous Welles broadcast "The War of the Worlds." He married band singer/actress Peg La Centra (1910-1996) in 1939 and over the years they appeared together on many radio programs. She also provided singing voices for such stars as Susan Hayward on celluloid. Welles next put Stewart in his films, with the classic Citizen Kane (1941) as Raymond, Kane's wily valet, and Stewart found himself in demand as an untrustworthy character player. He essayed a number of stark, sinister types to perfection, with roles in such films as Johnny Eager (1941), Mr. Lucky (1943), Champion (1949), Illegal Entry (1949), Twelve O'Clock High (1949), Carbine Williams (1952), The Bad and the Beautiful (1952) and Kiss Me Deadly (1955). On TV he became a regular on a couple of short-lived series -- Top Secret (1954) and The Man Who Never Was (1966). In the 1950s Stewart turned to stage and TV directing as well, helming a number of popular crimers such as Peter Gunn (1958), Michael Shayne (1960), Perry Mason (1957), It Takes a Thief (1968), Hawaii Five-O (1968) and Remington Steele (1982). His voice also fit the bill for cartoons in the 1960s. In 1974 Stewart suffered a heart attack while on location in New Mexico for Bite the Bullet (1975), but he returned sporadically to films, including the role of impresario Florenz Ziegfeld in W.C. Fields and Me (1976). He suffered a second and fatal heart attack in 1986 at age 77.
Paul Stewart is a member of Actor

💰Paul Stewart Net worth: $17 Million

Some Paul Stewart images

Famous Quotes:

Well, when Orson said he had a part for you, you went. So I left New York to play my first role in a picture at 500 dollars a week, three weeks' guarantee. I was on Citizen Kane for 11 weeks. … My first shot was a close-up in which Orson wanted a special smoke effect from my cigarette. I was rigged with tube that went under my clothes and down my finger to the cigarette, but somehow the contraption wouldn't exude smoke. "I want long cigarettes — the Russian kind!" Orson ordered. Everyone waited while the prop man fetched some Russian cigarettes. Just before the scene Orson Welles warned me: "Your head is going to fill the screen at the Radio City Music Hall" — at that time Citizen Kane was booked for the Music Hall. Then he said in his gruff manner, "Turn 'em." But just before I started, he added quietly in his warm voice, "Good luck." I blew the first take. It was 30, 40 takes before I completed a shot that Orson liked — and I had only one line. That was almost 30 years ago, but even today I have people repeat it to me, including young students. The line was: "Rosebud … I'll tell you about Rosebud …"

Biography/Timeline

1908

Paul Stewart was born in Manhattan, New York, on March 13, 1908, as Paul Sternberg. His parents were Maurice D. Sternberg, a salesman and credit agent for a textile manufacturer, and Nathalie C. (née Nathanson) Sternberg; both were born in Minneapolis. Stewart attended public school and completed two years at Columbia University, studying law. He had received first place in the Belasco Theatre Tournament in 1925 and decided on an acting career.

1930

Stewart began his stage career in New York as teenager. He made his Broadway debut in 1930, in Subway Express. He next appeared in the 1931 play, Two Seconds, adapted as a film the next year.

1932

In 1932, after two additional Broadway credits, Stewart moved to Cincinnati and went to work at radio station WLW. There, in 1928, radio pioneer Fred Smith had created the program Newscasting, which in 1931 evolved into the popular national news series, The March of Time. For 13 months Stewart worked in all aspects of radio production at WLW — acting, announcing, directing, producing, writing and creating sound effects. When he returned to New York he was on The March of Time and a member of radio's elite corps of actors.

1934

In 1934, Stewart introduced Orson Welles to Director Knowles Entrikin, who gave Welles his first job on radio, on The American School of the Air. "I'd been turning up for auditions and never landing a job until I met Paul Stewart," Welles recalled. "He's a lovely man; for years he was one of the main pillars of our Mercury broadcasts. He can't be given too much credit."

1935

In March 1935 Stewart saw Welles's stage performance in Archibald MacLeish's verse play Panic, and recommended him to Director Homer Fickett. Welles was auditioned and hired to join the repertory company that presented The March of Time.

1937

Stewart played various roles throughout Welles's memorable tenure as Lamont Cranston in The Shadow (September 1937–September 1938).

1938

In 1938 Welles expanded the range of the Mercury Theatre from Broadway to network radio with his CBS series, The Mercury Theatre on the Air, and Stewart became his associate Producer. In addition to playing a number of roles in the drama series and its sponsored continuation, The Campbell Playhouse, Stewart made significant contributions to the celebrated broadcast, "The War of the Worlds", as rehearsal Director, actor and co-writer.

1939

On January 14, 1939, in Arlington, Virginia, Stewart married Actress and singer Peg LaCentra (1910–1996), a vocalist with Artie Shaw's first orchestra who worked in radio, films and television. That September Welles called Stewart in New York.

1941

During World War II Stewart served with the New York-based Office of War Information (1941–43) and narrated documentaries including The World at War (1942). He worked under John Houseman at the newly created Voice of America (1942–43), broadcasting news, editorials and commentary from the U.S. press, and quotes from notable speeches, to audiences in Europe. When Houseman took his oath of allegiance as a U.S. citizen in March 1943, he chose Stewart to accompany him as his witness.

1944

Stewart was given leave to go to Hollywood to act in a few wartime films, including Mr. Lucky (1943), and worked as a barker in The Mercury Wonder Show, a magic-and-variety show produced by Welles and Joseph Cotten as a morale-boosting entertainment for U.S. Soldiers. Because of his comprehensive radio experience, Stewart was called upon by U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau, Jr. to prepare radio programs used to promote the purchase of War Bonds during World War II. He produced and directed Welles's Fifth War Loan broadcast from the Hollywood Bowl June 14, 1944, and produced, directed and acted in a number of patriotic episodes of the Cavalcade of America radio series.

1950

In 1950 Stewart took over the role of Doc in Joshua Logan's Broadway production of Mister Roberts, starring Henry Fonda.

1954

On television, Stewart's Director credits include the syndicated series, Top Secret (1954–55), in which he costarred with the young Gena Rowlands, and a notable episode of the TV series The Twilight Zone, "Little Girl Lost" (1962). He was host and narrator of the syndicated series Deadline (1959–61) and appeared in episodes of The Ford Theatre Hour, Suspense, Playhouse 90, Alcoa Theatre, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Asphalt Jungle, Perry Mason, Dr. Kildare, Mannix, Mission Impossible, The Name of the Game ("L.A. 2017"), McMillan & Wife, Columbo, The Rockford Files, Lou Grant and Remington Steele, among many other TV series.

1974

He had suffered a heart attack in 1974 during the first two weeks' filming of Richard Brooks's Western, Bite the Bullet, in which he was replaced.

1985

Orson Welles called upon Stewart to play a role in his film, The Other Side of the Wind, shot in the 1970s and left unfinished. When Welles died at his home in Hollywood October 10, 1985, Stewart was the first of his friends to arrive.

1986

Stewart died of heart failure at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles on February 17, 1986, after a long illness.

1999

In the 1999 film RKO 281, Paul Stewart was portrayed by Adrian Schiller.