Fritz Leiber

January 31, 1882 (age 66)

Chicago, Illinois, United States

While still in high school Leiber attended a performance of Richard Mansfield's, which turned his interests from platform to stage. On March 30, 1902, he made his professional debut as a "walking gentleman" and followed on April 6, 1902, with his first Shakespearean role as Cinna in Julius Caesar, both at Chicago's Dearborn Theatre. Soon thereafter he signed with a Chicago stock company, the People's Theatre. The rigors of a stock company provided excellent testing grounds, for he learned that his stage gait in a great variety of parts was in no way hampered by his being clubfooted. He had combated this handicap in childhood by wearing a corrective iron shoe with lifts and had succeeded as a high school track star. The challenge he met in the arduous stock schedule, moreover, prepared him to champion repertory in its future waning days. His appearance until the spring of 1904 in the more than thirty roles ranging from "supers" (walkons) to leads in several minor stock and touring companies ripened him for more important ventures. In April 1904, Leiber joined Ben Greet's Woodland Players. Hired initially as a "utility" actor, he eventually assumed more important roles, culminating in Prospero, which he played whenever Greet was incapacitated. In December 1907, he joined Julia Marlowe for a season as her leading juvenile. Producer William A. Brady then signed him to a three-year contract with Robert Mantell's company. From 1908 until 1915 he played second leads exclusively for Mantell, whose popularity in large cities across the United States enabled Leiber to be introduced as a significant classical actor. He supported Mantell as Edgar, Mercutio, Laertes, Macduff, Bassanio, Iago, Richmond, Antony, Falconbridge, and Jacques. When Mantell disbanded his company in 1915 to go to Hollywood, Leiber tested himself in nonclassical roles. His brief appearances that season in Edward Locke's melodrama The Revolt and Belasco's romantic Van der Decken were critical failures. His few later attempts to break from Shakespeare, as in E. Holmes Hinkley's High Tide (1925) and Paul Green's The Field God (1927), also received poor notices. After his film debut in Primitive Call (1916), in which he played an American Indian, he rejoined Mantell. He wanted to play leads, and Mantell, aware of Leiber's box-office appeal, agreed to star him in Hamlet, supported by Mantell's company. Leiber opened in New York on December 18, 1918, to mixed reviews. Mantell then continued to alternate both Hamlet and Romeo with him, but critics encouraged Leiber to play on his own. On November 8, 1920, he opened his own company in Chicago with a two-week repertory of Richard III, Romeo and Juliet, The Merchant of Venice, Hamlet, and Macbeth. These became staples in the Leiber repertoire; in future years he added Julius Caesar, King Lear, and The Taming of the Shrew. During the 1920's he devoted himself to touring. In 1929 the Chicago Civic Shakespeare Society, founded by Midwest industrial and cultural leaders headed by the utilities magnate Harley L. Clarke, invited him to form a resident repertory company at the Civic Theatre. It opened to highly favorable reviews on November 11, 1929, and then moved to New York City for a limited engagement. Critical and financial success for the society's initial season could not halt the destructive effect of the depression and competing motion pictures. Clarke, opposing Leiber's judgment, assembled an all-star cast in a futile attempt to revive a failing box office. The Chicago Civic Shakespeare Society folded after the 1931-1932 season. Leiber resumed touring with his own company, but by 1935 abandoned the road for the financial security of films. He made about thirty-six movies from 1935 to 1949, ranging from low-grade melodramas to historical spectacles, but he never realized his dream of acting Shakespearean leads in films. An ascetic, exotic quality, suggested by his long gaunt face, hawk nose, chiseled jaw, and high forehead, prompted producers to cast him as primitives, priests, and historical figures. He appeared in A Tale of Two Cities (1935), The Prince and the Pauper (1936), The Story of Louis Pasteur (1936), Cleopatra (1917), Champagne Waltz (1937), All This And Heaven Too (1940), Desert Song (1944), Another Part of the Forest (1945), and Adventures of Casanova (1948). Leiber suffered a heart attack in 1943 and died in 1949 of a coronary occlusion in Pacific Palisades, California. His remains were cremated by request of his wife. Leiber in his younger days was an impassioned, dynamic, virile actor. He seemed freshly natural in contrast to the aging Mantell. His acting lacked studious refinement, but he held his audiences through a nervous force that later led some critics to call him too flamboyant. Critics were usually more appreciative of Leiber outside of New York, and it was to audiences in smaller cities that he made his greatest contribution. While other actors turned to movies or long runs, Leiber played the road. He chose to present Shakespeare when the contemporary hit became the trend during the 1920's. His Chicago Civic Shakespeare Society was the first and, during its time, the only resident Shakespearean repertory company in the United States. A versatile practitioner, he functioned as actor, director, designer, and producer. His productions revealed how Shakespeare's plays could successfully be molded to the new stagecraft theories which called for simplified, symbolic, nonnaturalistic productions. In Hamlet, for example, he used a single unit set which established locale by changing suggestive scenic pieces. His productions flowed without stopping for cumbersome shifts. He even tried The Taming of the Shrew in contemporary dress (1928).

Fritz Reuter Leiber

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Actor producer

Background

Fritz Leiber was born in Chicago, the fifth of the six children of Albrecht Leiber and Meta (von Klett) Leiber. Albrecht Leiber and his family emigrated from Germany's Ruhr district to the United States in pursuit of a politically liberal environment. He served as an officer in the Civil War and held various political appointments in Springfield and Chicago, Illinois. Although he died when Fritz was only ten, his scholarly interests and Republican views shaped Fritz's penchant for oratory and debate. In later life his Episcopalian beliefs, firm Republican politics, and conservative, methodical offstage personality also reflected some of his father's influence.

Education

He went to Chicago's Lake View High School.

Career

While still in high school Leiber attended a performance of Richard Mansfield's, which turned his interests from platform to stage. On March 30, 1902, he made his professional debut as a "walking gentleman" and followed on April 6, 1902, with his first Shakespearean role as Cinna in Julius Caesar, both at Chicago's Dearborn Theatre. Soon thereafter he signed with a Chicago stock company, the People's Theatre. The rigors of a stock company provided excellent testing grounds, for he learned that his stage gait in a great variety of parts was in no way hampered by his being clubfooted. He had combated this handicap in childhood by wearing a corrective iron shoe with lifts and had succeeded as a high school track star. The challenge he met in the arduous stock schedule, moreover, prepared him to champion repertory in its future waning days. His appearance until the spring of 1904 in the more than thirty roles ranging from "supers" (walkons) to leads in several minor stock and touring companies ripened him for more important ventures.

In April 1904, Leiber joined Ben Greet's Woodland Players. Hired initially as a "utility" actor, he eventually assumed more important roles, culminating in Prospero, which he played whenever Greet was incapacitated. In December 1907, he joined Julia Marlowe for a season as her leading juvenile. Producer William A. Brady then signed him to a three-year contract with Robert Mantell's company. From 1908 until 1915 he played second leads exclusively for Mantell, whose popularity in large cities across the United States enabled Leiber to be introduced as a significant classical actor. He supported Mantell as Edgar, Mercutio, Laertes, Macduff, Bassanio, Iago, Richmond, Antony, Falconbridge, and Jacques.

When Mantell disbanded his company in 1915 to go to Hollywood, Leiber tested himself in nonclassical roles. His brief appearances that season in Edward Locke's melodrama The Revolt and Belasco's romantic Van der Decken were critical failures. His few later attempts to break from Shakespeare, as in E. Holmes Hinkley's High Tide (1925) and Paul Green's The Field God (1927), also received poor notices.

After his film debut in Primitive Call (1916), in which he played an American Indian, he rejoined Mantell. He wanted to play leads, and Mantell, aware of Leiber's box-office appeal, agreed to star him in Hamlet, supported by Mantell's company. Leiber opened in New York on December 18, 1918, to mixed reviews. Mantell then continued to alternate both Hamlet and Romeo with him, but critics encouraged Leiber to play on his own.

On November 8, 1920, he opened his own company in Chicago with a two-week repertory of Richard III, Romeo and Juliet, The Merchant of Venice, Hamlet, and Macbeth. These became staples in the Leiber repertoire; in future years he added Julius Caesar, King Lear, and The Taming of the Shrew. During the 1920's he devoted himself to touring. In 1929 the Chicago Civic Shakespeare Society, founded by Midwest industrial and cultural leaders headed by the utilities magnate Harley L. Clarke, invited him to form a resident repertory company at the Civic Theatre. It opened to highly favorable reviews on November 11, 1929, and then moved to New York City for a limited engagement. Critical and financial success for the society's initial season could not halt the destructive effect of the depression and competing motion pictures. Clarke, opposing Leiber's judgment, assembled an all-star cast in a futile attempt to revive a failing box office. The Chicago Civic Shakespeare Society folded after the 1931-1932 season. Leiber resumed touring with his own company, but by 1935 abandoned the road for the financial security of films.

He made about thirty-six movies from 1935 to 1949, ranging from low-grade melodramas to historical spectacles, but he never realized his dream of acting Shakespearean leads in films. An ascetic, exotic quality, suggested by his long gaunt face, hawk nose, chiseled jaw, and high forehead, prompted producers to cast him as primitives, priests, and historical figures. He appeared in A Tale of Two Cities (1935), The Prince and the Pauper (1936), The Story of Louis Pasteur (1936), Cleopatra (1917), Champagne Waltz (1937), All This And Heaven Too (1940), Desert Song (1944), Another Part of the Forest (1945), and Adventures of Casanova (1948).

Leiber suffered a heart attack in 1943 and died in 1949 of a coronary occlusion in Pacific Palisades, California. His remains were cremated by request of his wife.

Leiber in his younger days was an impassioned, dynamic, virile actor. He seemed freshly natural in contrast to the aging Mantell. His acting lacked studious refinement, but he held his audiences through a nervous force that later led some critics to call him too flamboyant. Critics were usually more appreciative of Leiber outside of New York, and it was to audiences in smaller cities that he made his greatest contribution. While other actors turned to movies or long runs, Leiber played the road. He chose to present Shakespeare when the contemporary hit became the trend during the 1920's. His Chicago Civic Shakespeare Society was the first and, during its time, the only resident Shakespearean repertory company in the United States. A versatile practitioner, he functioned as actor, director, designer, and producer. His productions revealed how Shakespeare's plays could successfully be molded to the new stagecraft theories which called for simplified, symbolic, nonnaturalistic productions. In Hamlet, for example, he used a single unit set which established locale by changing suggestive scenic pieces. His productions flowed without stopping for cumbersome shifts. He even tried The Taming of the Shrew in contemporary dress (1928).

Achievements

In an unusually long career Leiber linked the nineteenth-century Shakespearean tradition of Edwin Booth, Mantell, and E. H. Sothern with the twentieth century's theatrical vision. He was highly respected as a Shakespearean actor on stage, he also had a great career in film. Among his more successful parts in films were Gaspard in A Tale of Two Cities (1935), Father Andrew in The Prince and the Pauper (1936), and Dr. Charbonnet in The Story of Louis Pasteur (1936).