Background
He was born James Harold Skelley in Alleghenyville, Pennsylvania to James and Martha Skelley.
He was born James Harold Skelley in Alleghenyville, Pennsylvania to James and Martha Skelley.
Skelley was educated at Sacred Heart School in Davenport and Saint Bede Academy in Peru, Illinois.
His family moved to Davenport, Iowa when he was four. He left home at the age of 15 and joined the circus. He acted in his first stage production, The Time, the Place and the Girl, at the LaSalle Theater in Chicago when he was 16.
Foreign a short period of time he was a backup first baseman for the Boston Braves and a prizefight manager.
Foreign his professional name he shortened his middle name Harold to Hal and dropped the final "e" in Skelley. Skelly became a veteran of medicine shows, musical comedy, burlesque, Lew Dockstader"s minstrels and opera.
He joined the Master of Arts Zinn musical comedy company in San Francisco where his eccentric dancing ability earned him the nickname "Tumbling Harold Skelly". Always enamored with the circus, he spent a year with Barnum & Bailey.
Skelly toured China and Japan with a musical comedy troupe, the Raymond Teale Company.
Skelly made his debut in Fiddler’s Three (1918) and went on to appear in ten other shows on In 1927, he played a starring role alongside Barbara Stanwyck, in her first hit, the musical production "Burlesque". Paramount Pictures invited the two to star in the 1929 talkie film version of the show, retitled The Dance of Life because studio executives claimed the original title too risqué, but surely these veteran showmen were well aware that the term "dance of life" was burlesque slang meaning "fornication". Stanwyck turned down the offer, while Skelly reprised his role as charismatic drunk "Skid" Johnson.
Skelly made a total of ten films, including the Woman Trap (1929), Behind the Make-Up (1930), and The Shadow Laughs (1933).
He was also featured on two movie soundtracks. Skelly was killed in a train-auto accident in West Cornwall, Connecticut when the truck he was driving was struck by the New York to Pittsfield train of the New Haven Railroad at a crossing.
News reports at the time said he was staying with friends and he was looking for a dog that had run away. Hal Skelly acted in the following shows on:
Fiddlers Three (1918), as Sam Wigglesbury
The Night Boat (1920), as Freddie Ides
The Girl in the Spotlight (1920), as Watchem Tripp
Orange Blossoms (1922), as Jimmy Flynn
Mary Jane McKane (1923–1924), as Joe McGillicudy
Betty Lee (1924–1925), as Wallingford Speed
Burlesque, (1927–1928), as Skid Johnson
Melody (1933), as François Trapadoux
Ghost Writer (1933), as Bill Harkins
Queer People (1934), as Theodore Anthony White
Come What May (1934), as Chet Harrison.