Biography

Warner Baxter

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Warner Baxter claimed to have an early pre-disposition toward show business: "I discovered a boy a block away who would eat worms and swallow flies for a penny. For one-third of the profits, I exhibited him in a tent." When he was age 9, his widowed mother moved to San Francisco where, following the earthquake of 1906, his family lived in a tent for two weeks "in mortal terror of the fire." By 1910 he was in vaudeville and from there went on to Broadway plays and movies. A matinée idol in the silents, he came to prominence as the Cisco Kid with In Old Arizona (1928), for which he won an Oscar. He went on to star with Myrna Loy in Penthouse (1933) and to what many consider his best role, that of the doctor who treated Abraham Lincoln's assassin, in The Prisoner of Shark Island (1936). That year his $284,000 income topped the industry. In 1943, after slipping into a string of B-pictures, he began his Dr. Ordway "Crime Doctor" series with Crime Doctor (1943). He had suffered a nervous breakdown, and these pictures were easy on him (studio sets for one month, two films a year). Following a lobotomy to relieve pains of arthritis, he died of pneumonia.
- IMDb mini biography by: Ed Stephan <stephan@cc.wwu.edu> (qv's & corrections by A. Nonymous)

He was the first American to win the Academy Award for Best Actor.
Got the part of the Cisco Kid in the movie In Old Arizona (1928) due in part to veteran director Raoul Walsh's automobile accident in which he lost an eye. Walsh was set to play the Kid.
His mother Jane Barrett Baxter died on March 29, 1962 at the age of 92, having outlived him by almost eleven years.
First actor to portray the character of Jay Gatsby on-screen in The Great Gatsby (1926).
Was said to have had a fear of horses.

Most actors object to typing. I don't. In the first place, it is the public who types an actor, not the studio. If an actor is so good in a certain character, he can afford to submerge his urge to portray many parts in favor of a neat financial return. Yes sir, give me a character that American actors want to see me in and typing won't worry me.
I was a failure and a success three times in Hollywood, I have even had troubles paying my rent. Three depressions were suddenly ended by three pictures, each of which boosted me higher than I had ever been. 'In Old Arizona' ended a two-year slump. 'The Cisco Kid' brought me back into public favor after a series of bad stories. And '42nd Street' revived me after 'The Cisco Kid' had worn off. Like most actors, I wanted to cling to juvenility to the bitter end. But after I had repeated '42nd Steet' several times, it occurred to me that actors, drugged by pride, can make first-class asses of themselves.
[on his beginning in show business] I discovered a boy a block away who would eat worms and swallow flies for a penny. Fo one-third of the profits, I exhibited him in a tent.

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