Photo of Edgar Kennedy
Acting

Edgar Kennedy

Profession
Acting
Born
April 25, 1890 · Monterey, California, USA
Died
November 9, 1948

Biography

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Edgar Livingston Kennedy (April 26, 1890 – November 9, 1948) was an American comedic film character actor, known as "Slow Burn". A slow burn is an exasperated facial expression, performed very deliberately; Kennedy embellished this by rubbing his hand over his bald head and across his face, in an attempt to hold his temper. Kennedy is best known for a small role as a lemonade vendor in the Marx Brothers film Duck Soup, as well as the many Hal Roach films he appeared in. Kennedy became so identified with frustration that practically every studio hired him to play hotheads. He often played dumb cops, detectives, and even a prison warden; sometimes he was a grouchy moving man, truck driver, or blue-collar workman. His character usually lost his temper at least once. In Diplomaniacs, Kennedy presides over an international tribunal, where Wheeler & Woolsey want to do something about world peace. "Well, ya can't do anything about it here", yells Kennedy, "this is a peace conference!" Kennedy, established as the poster boy for frustration, even starred in an instructional film titled The Other Fellow, in which loudmouthed roadhog Edgar always vents his anger on other drivers (each one played by Kennedy as well), little realizing that, to them, he is "the other fellow." Perhaps his most unusual roles were as a puppeteer in the detective mystery The Falcon Strikes Back and as a philosophical bartender inspired to create exotic cocktails in Harold Lloyd's last film, The Sin of Harold Diddlebock (1947). He also played comical detectives opposite two titans of acting: John Barrymore in Twentieth Century (1934) and Rex Harrison in Unfaithfully Yours (1948); in the latter, he tells conductor Harrison that "Nobody handles Handel like you handle Handel." Kennedy died of throat cancer at the Motion Picture Hospital, San Fernando Valley on 9 November 1948. His body was interred at the Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City, Los Angeles County, California.

Known for

Duck Soup poster
Duck Soup
Film · 1933 · ★ 7.3
A Star Is Born poster
A Star Is Born
Film · 1937 · ★ 7.2
Anchors Aweigh poster
Anchors Aweigh
Film · 1945 · ★ 6.8
Unfaithfully Yours poster
Unfaithfully Yours
Film · 1948 · ★ 7.2
Twentieth Century poster
Twentieth Century
Film · 1934 · ★ 6.8
Making a Living poster
Making a Living
Film · 1914 · ★ 5.7
San Francisco poster
San Francisco
Film · 1936 · ★ 6.6
Tillie's Punctured Romance poster
Tillie's Punctured Romance
Film · 1914 · ★ 6.2
Perfect Day poster
Perfect Day
Film · 1929 · ★ 7.0
A Film Johnnie poster
A Film Johnnie
Film · 1914 · ★ 5.5
The Rounders poster
The Rounders
Film · 1914 · ★ 6.1
It Happened Tomorrow poster
It Happened Tomorrow
Film · 1944 · ★ 6.8

Filmography