Louis Mann was born on April 20, 1865 in New York City, the son of Daniel and Caroline (Hecht) Mann. His first stage appearance was at the Stadt Theatre on the Bowery, New York, at the age of three, when he impersonated a snowflake in a Christmas pantomime. But his parents had no thought of a stage career for him.
In youth he worked for a time in a haberdasher's shop, and then was sent to the University of California. After some two years of study, he left the University surreptitiously to join a theatrical stock company in San Francisco. His parents at length traced him to central New York, where the company was playing East Lynne, Ingomar, and other old favorites. Unknown to him, the parents saw him perform, and deciding that he had talent, gave him $200 to further his dramatic education; but Louis turned it over to his manager to bolster the shaky finances of the company.
For several years he played in support of Tommaso Salvini, Lewis Morrison, E. H. Sothern, Cyril Maude, and Daniel Bandmann. By 1890 he was making ventures at the head of small companies of his own in Lady Audley's Secret and other strenuous dramas. In 1892 he scored a hit in the part of Dick Winters in Incog. In the following year he again took a company of his own on tour in The Laughing Girl. His burlesque of Du Maurier's Svengali in The Merry World in 1895 was much praised. In 1897 in The Girl from Paris he shared honors with his wife, Clara Lipman. Throughout the greater part of his career, Mann played dialect roles German, Jewish, French, and in The Red Kloof (1901) he assumed the part of a South African Boer farmer. In The Telephone Girl (1898), The Girl in the Barracks (1899), All on Account of Eliza (1900), and Hoch the Consul (1902) he continued playing these eccentric leading roles, usually with his wife as co-star. In 1903 he appeared for a time with the Weber and Fields burlesque company. In 1904 he played Baron von Walden in The Second Fiddle, and in 1906-07 he appeared in New York and London in Julie Bonbon, written by Clara Lipman. The White Hen followed in 1907, and then The New Generation, later renamed The Man Who Stood Still, which continued from 1908 to 1910. In 1910 came his own play, The Cheater, and in 1911 Elevating a Husband, written by his wife (in collaboration with Samuel Shipman), and utilizing Mann's enthusiasm for baseball. Children of To-Day in 1913, The Bubble (1915), and The Warriors (1917) were not remarkable, but in 1918 he scored one of his greatest successes as co-star with Sam Bernard in Friendly Enemies, a war play. When it appeared in Washington, President Wilson sat in a box, and at Mann's invitation arose and spoke a few words in praise of the play--the first time in history that such an incident had occurred. This comedy ran for more than a year in New York and toured the country until late in 1920. In The Unwritten Chapter, Mann next appeared as Haym Salomon, Jewish financier of the American Revolution, in whose history the actor was deeply interested. Subsequent appearances were in The Whirl of New York, Nature's Nobleman, and Give and Take.
Mann was a person of strong opinions and intense emotions, qualities which he injected into his stage characters. He was one of the organizers of the Actors' Fidelity League, which fought the Actors' Equity strike in 1919. He was considered as one of the greatest and most versatile actors of his day. Attesting to his popularity was the crowd at his funeral numbering over two thousand people who came to give their last respects.
On October 28, 1895 he married Clara Lipman, actress and playwright.
