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Frank Albert Daniels was born on August 15, 1856 in Dayton, Ohioб United States. He was the son of Henry L. and Belinda (Atwood) Daniels, who had moved to Ohio from Litchfield, Connecticut. His father was a dentist. When he was still a child his family moved to South Boston.
Daniels attended public school of South Boston and later Pierce's Business College. He then went to work for a wood-engraver in Boston, devoting his spare time to study at the New England Conservatory of Music.
As a result of the study at the New England Conservatory of Music Daniels secured a chance to make his professional debut as the sheriff in The Chimes of Normandy, in Chelsea, Massachusetts, in 1879. He was successful in the part and joined the company at the Gaiety Theatre, Boston, as second comedian.
He first attracted public attention, however, in a vaudeville farce called The Electric Doll (or The Electric Spark as it was titled when it was played in New York in 1882-83). He played this farce for three years, both in the United States and in England. On his return from England he appeared as Old Sport in Hoyt's farce, The Rag Baby. The New York opening was at Tony Pastor's, April 14, 1884. This play established Hoyt's reputation as a dramatist. It ran for three years, and Daniels became a member of the firm of Hoyt, Thomas & Daniels as proprietors of the production.
He left the firm in 1887 to star in Little Puck, a dramatization of Anstey's story, Vice Versa. Again the run lasted for three years. In 1891 he produced The Attorney and then played Shrimps in Princess Bonnie. It was in 1895, however, that he found a vehicle which gave full scope to his comedic and musical talents and which could gain him admittance to the best stages in the country. This was a musical comedy by Harry B. Smith, with a score by a member of the Metropolitan Opera House orchestra, Victor Herbert. It was called The Wizard of the Nile, and it carried both Daniels and Herbert to fame.
Two years later the same composer and librettist supplied Daniels with another musical comedy which was equally tuneful and popular, The Idol's Eye. It contained a song, "The Tattooed Man, " which swept the country. This song about a man whose wife admired him because he was so artistically illustrated was irresistibly comic as Daniels sang it. The Idol's Eye was followed by The Ameer, and that in 1903 by The Office Boy, the book by Harry B. Smith and music by Ludwig Englander.
In 1906 his vehicle was Sergeant Brue, and his role that of a comic "cop. " In 1907 Harry B. Smith and Victor Herbert supplied him with The Tattooed Man. This was followed by Miss Hook of Holland, and this, in turn, by The Pink Lady. In 1913, at the conclusion of its run, he retired from the stage to his home in Rye, New York, and a winter place in Florida.
Daniels later appeared in three films with Harold Lloyd in 1919: Count the Votes, Pay Your Dues, and His Only Father. His last film was Among Those Present, in 1921.
Daniels was a major star of a musical comedy on stage as well as of early black-and-white silent films, particularly those of Vitagraph Studios, for whom he developed popular characters such as Captain Jiggs, Kernel Nutt, and Mr. Jack. He was known for his great singing voice and naturally comic acting, especially his walk and "acrobatic eyebrows".
Daniels had a comical, round visage set upon a short, roly-poly body, and his eyebrow liftings and other facial contortions, expressing the plaintive bewilderment of a simple man in a complex universe, were accomplished with the skill of the great clowns. To his clowning skill, however, he added the ability to sing and to rattle off with perfect enunciation and droll by-play the most tongue-twisting of patter songs. In this respect he resembled his contemporary, DeWolf Hopper.
Daniels was married in 1895 to Bessie Sanson, an actress. They had no children but adopted a daughter. Daniels's wife died in 1932, and he died in 1935 at West Palm Beach, Florida.
