Author Archives: Nancy Louise Rutherford

With all the hoopla circulating around the platinum anniversary of what was arguably Hollywood’s greatest year, 1939, it’s worth remembering that this entire era was rich for more than just great movies. The decades on either side of 1939 were also the golden age for the screen’s great character actors. While the stars usually managed to squeeze out two, maybe three pictures a year, it often appeared that the character actors of this time were sprinting from one sound stage to the next. The good ones were very, very busy, and one of the greatest was Thomas Mitchell.
it around and watch enough TCM, especially the stuff that gets aired at five in the morning, and you might begin to wonder if Mitchell wasn’t legally mandated to appear in every third Hollywood film made between the mid-1930′s and mid-1940′s. He wasn’t, of course, but he made nearly fifty films during that period. By the time of his passing in 1962, his combined film and TV credits totaled 103. Continue reading →