Andy Clyde
Encyclopedia
Andy Clyde was a Scottish
movie and TV actor whose career spanned more than four decade
s. He broke into silent films in 1925 as a Mack Sennett
comic. Born Andrew Allan Clyde, he came from a family that had been prominently identified with the theatre for generations; his brother David Clyde
and sister Jean Clyde also became screen actors.
He remained with Mack Sennett and made a successful transition to sound films. In 1932, when the Sennett studio was facing financial problems, Sennett cut Clyde's salary. Clyde objected and Sennett put the "old man" costume on character actor Irving Bacon
. Audiences saw through it and Sennett abandoned the character. Sennett's distributor, Educational Pictures
, took over the Andy Clyde series, which continued for two more years.
Columbia Pictures
launched its short subject
department in 1934 and Andy Clyde was one of the first comedy stars signed by producer Jules White
. Unlike many of the Columbia short-subject comedians who indulged in broad facial and physical gestures, Clyde was subtler and more economical: his comic timing was so good that he could merely lift an eyebrow, shudder slightly, or mutter "My, my, my" for humorous effect. His work for Columbia was so prolific that, from the mid-1940s, the studio was able to produce lower-budgeted remakes, editing older scenes into the new ones. You Were Never Uglier
(1944) was remade with the same principals in 1953 as Hooked and Rooked, for example. Clyde was such an audience favorite that he continued to star in Columbia shorts through 1956. He outlasted every comedian on the Columbia payroll except The Three Stooges.
Andy Clyde also kept busy as a character actor in feature films; for example, he played a sad provincial postman in the Katharine Hepburn
film The Little Minister
and Charles Coburn
's drinking buddy in The Green Years
. In the 1940s, he gravitated toward outdoor and western adventures. Clyde is well remembered for his roles as a comic sidekick
, usually teaming with William Boyd
in the Hopalong Cassidy
series (as "California Carlson") or with Whip Wilson
in Monogram Pictures
' low-budget western
movies (as "Winks"). Clyde also worked on the Hopalong Cassidy
"record readers" issued by Capitol Records
in the 1950s.
Clyde's last theatrical film was released in 1956, after which he worked in television, having appeared on Rod Cameron
's early syndicated
series City Detective
. He also had recurring roles on CBS's Lassie
and ABC
's The Real McCoys
. In the latter he was the foil for another veteran character actor, Walter Brennan
; Clyde played friendly neighbor "George McMichael" to Brennan's "Grandpa Amos McCoy." Madge Blake
played Flora, the sister of George McMichael, on The Real McCoys. As Frank Myers on The Andy Griffith Show (1961), Clyde played an eccentric old man who the town tries to evict. Clyde appeared as "Grandpa", a series regular, on the 1964-1965 ABC military comedy No Time for Sergeants
, starring Sammy Jackson
. The series was inspired by an earlier Andy Griffith
film of the same name.
Clyde continued to perform on television until his death.
Andy Clyde has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
.
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
movie and TV actor whose career spanned more than four decade
Decade
A decade is a period of 10 years. The word is derived from the Ancient Greek dekas which means ten. This etymology is sometime confused with the Latin decas and dies , which is not correct....
s. He broke into silent films in 1925 as a Mack Sennett
Mack Sennett
Mack Sennett was a Canadian-born American director and was known as the innovator of slapstick comedy in film. During his lifetime he was known at times as the "King of Comedy"...
comic. Born Andrew Allan Clyde, he came from a family that had been prominently identified with the theatre for generations; his brother David Clyde
David Clyde
David Eugene Clyde is a former left-handed Major League Baseball pitcher who played all or part of five seasons for the Texas Rangers and Cleveland Indians...
and sister Jean Clyde also became screen actors.
Career
Andy Clyde's mastery of makeup allowed him tremendous versatility; he could play everything from grubby young guttersnipes to old crackpot scientists. Clyde hit upon an "old man" characterization in his short comedies, which were immediately successful. Adopting a gray wig and mustache, he used this makeup for the rest of his short-subject career, and the character was so durable that he literally grew into it. He starred in short comedies longer than any other actor: 27 years.He remained with Mack Sennett and made a successful transition to sound films. In 1932, when the Sennett studio was facing financial problems, Sennett cut Clyde's salary. Clyde objected and Sennett put the "old man" costume on character actor Irving Bacon
Irving Bacon
Irving Bacon was an American character actor who appeared in over 400 films. He played on the stage for a number of years before getting into films in 1920. Bacon was sometimes cast in films directed by his namesake Lloyd Bacon such as The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse...
. Audiences saw through it and Sennett abandoned the character. Sennett's distributor, Educational Pictures
Educational Pictures
Educational Pictures was a film distribution company founded in 1919 by Earle Hammons . Educational primarily distributed short subjects, and today is probably best known for its series of 1930s comedies starring Buster Keaton, as well as for a series of one-reel comedies featuring Shirley...
, took over the Andy Clyde series, which continued for two more years.
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...
launched its short subject
Short subject
A short film is any film not long enough to be considered a feature film. No consensus exists as to where that boundary is drawn: the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all...
department in 1934 and Andy Clyde was one of the first comedy stars signed by producer Jules White
Jules White
Jules White born Julius Weiss was a film director and producer best known for his short-subject comedies starring the Three Stooges.-Early years:...
. Unlike many of the Columbia short-subject comedians who indulged in broad facial and physical gestures, Clyde was subtler and more economical: his comic timing was so good that he could merely lift an eyebrow, shudder slightly, or mutter "My, my, my" for humorous effect. His work for Columbia was so prolific that, from the mid-1940s, the studio was able to produce lower-budgeted remakes, editing older scenes into the new ones. You Were Never Uglier
You Were Never Uglier
You Were Never Uglier was a June 2, 1944 comedy short subject motion picture by Columbia Pictures. It starred Andy Clyde, Emmett Lynn, and Esther Howard.-Credits:*Director/Producer: Jules White...
(1944) was remade with the same principals in 1953 as Hooked and Rooked, for example. Clyde was such an audience favorite that he continued to star in Columbia shorts through 1956. He outlasted every comedian on the Columbia payroll except The Three Stooges.
Andy Clyde also kept busy as a character actor in feature films; for example, he played a sad provincial postman in the Katharine Hepburn
Katharine Hepburn
Katharine Houghton Hepburn was an American actress of film, stage, and television. In a career that spanned 62 years as a leading lady, she was best known for playing strong-willed, sophisticated women in both dramas and comedies...
film The Little Minister
The Little Minister
The Little Minister is a 1934 American drama film directed by Richard Wallace. The screenplay by Jane Murfin, Sarah Y. Mason, and Victor Heerman is based on the 1891 novel and subsequent 1897 play of the same title by J. M. Barrie. It was the fifth feature film adaptation of the works, following...
and Charles Coburn
Charles Coburn
Charles Douville Coburn was an American film and theater actor.-Biography:Coburn was born in Macon, Georgia, the son of Scots-Irish Americans Emma Louise Sprigman and Moses Douville Coburn. Growing up in Savannah, he started out doing odd jobs at the local Savannah Theater, handing out programs,...
's drinking buddy in The Green Years
The Green Years (film)
The Green Years is a 1946 American comedy-drama film featuring Charles Coburn, Tom Drake, Hume Cronyn, Gladys Cooper, Dean Stockwell, and Jessica Tandy, based on A. J. Cronin's novel of the same title...
. In the 1940s, he gravitated toward outdoor and western adventures. Clyde is well remembered for his roles as a comic sidekick
Sidekick
A sidekick is a close companion who is generally regarded as subordinate to the one he accompanies. Some well-known fictional sidekicks are Don Quixote's Sancho Panza, Sherlock Holmes' Doctor Watson, The Lone Ranger's Tonto, The Green Hornet's Kato and Batman's Robin.-Origins:The origin of the...
, usually teaming with William Boyd
William Boyd (actor)
William Lawrence Boyd was an American film actor best known for portraying Hopalong Cassidy.-Biography:...
in the Hopalong Cassidy
Hopalong Cassidy
Hopalong Cassidy is a fictional cowboy hero created in 1904 by the author Clarence E. Mulford, who wrote a series of popular short stories and twenty-eight novels based on the character....
series (as "California Carlson") or with Whip Wilson
Whip Wilson
Whip Wilson was an American cowboy film star of the late 1940s and into the 1950s, known for his roles in B-westerns....
in Monogram Pictures
Monogram Pictures
Monogram Pictures Corporation is a Hollywood studio that produced and released films, most on low budgets, between 1931 and 1953, when the firm completed a transition to the name Allied Artists Pictures Corporation. Monogram is considered a leader among the smaller studios sometimes referred to...
' low-budget western
Western (genre)
The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...
movies (as "Winks"). Clyde also worked on the Hopalong Cassidy
Hopalong Cassidy
Hopalong Cassidy is a fictional cowboy hero created in 1904 by the author Clarence E. Mulford, who wrote a series of popular short stories and twenty-eight novels based on the character....
"record readers" issued by Capitol Records
Capitol Records
Capitol Records is a major United States based record label, formerly located in Los Angeles, but operating in New York City as part of Capitol Music Group. Its former headquarters building, the Capitol Tower, is a major landmark near the corner of Hollywood and Vine...
in the 1950s.
Clyde's last theatrical film was released in 1956, after which he worked in television, having appeared on Rod Cameron
Rod Cameron
Rod Cameron was a Canadian-born movie actor whose career extended from the 1930s to the 1970s. He appeared in horror, war, action and science fiction movies, but is best remembered for his many Westerns....
's early syndicated
Television syndication
In broadcasting, syndication is the sale of the right to broadcast radio shows and television shows by multiple radio stations and television stations, without going through a broadcast network, though the process of syndication may conjure up structures like those of a network itself, by its very...
series City Detective
City Detective (TV series)
City Detective is a half-hour syndicated crime drama starring Rod Cameron as 43-year-old Bart Grant, a tough 1950s New York City police lieutenant. The first of three consecutive Rod Cameron series, City Detective aired between January 1, 1953 and May 10, 1955...
. He also had recurring roles on CBS's Lassie
Lassie (1954 TV series)
Lassie is an American television series that follows the adventures of a female Rough Collie named Lassie and her companions, human and animal. The show was the creation of producer Robert Maxwell and animal trainer Rudd Weatherwax and was televised from September 12, 1954, to March 24, 1973...
and ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
's The Real McCoys
The Real McCoys
The Real McCoys is an American situation comedy co-produced by Danny Thomas' "Marterto Productions", in association with Walter Brennan and Irving Pincus's "Westgate" company...
. In the latter he was the foil for another veteran character actor, Walter Brennan
Walter Brennan
Walter Brennan was an American actor. Brennan won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor on three separate occasions, which is currently the record for most wins.-Early life:...
; Clyde played friendly neighbor "George McMichael" to Brennan's "Grandpa Amos McCoy." Madge Blake
Madge Blake
Madge Blake was an American character actress best remembered for her role as Aunt Harriet Cooper on ABC's Batman TV series of the 1960s.-Early life:...
played Flora, the sister of George McMichael, on The Real McCoys. As Frank Myers on The Andy Griffith Show (1961), Clyde played an eccentric old man who the town tries to evict. Clyde appeared as "Grandpa", a series regular, on the 1964-1965 ABC military comedy No Time for Sergeants
No Time for Sergeants
No Time for Sergeants is a 1954 best-selling novel by Mac Hyman, which was later adapted into a teleplay on The United States Steel Hour, a popular Broadway play and 1958 motion picture, as well as a 1964 television series. The book chronicles the misadventures of a country bumpkin named Will...
, starring Sammy Jackson
Sammy Jackson
Sammy Jackson was an American actor known particularly for his roles reflecting rural life and a country music disc jockey, although he also played pop-standards during 1983 at Los Angeles's KMPC.-Biography and persona:...
. The series was inspired by an earlier Andy Griffith
Andy Griffith
Andy Samuel Griffith is an American actor, director, producer, Grammy Award-winning Southern-gospel singer, and writer. He gained prominence in the starring role in director Elia Kazan's epic film A Face in the Crowd before he became better known for his television roles, playing the lead...
film of the same name.
Personal life
Clyde was married to Elsie Tarron, once one of the Sennett Bathing Beauties. Jules White recalled that Clyde became a father in middle age, and was devastated when his nine-year-old son died.Clyde continued to perform on television until his death.
Andy Clyde has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Hollywood Walk of Fame
The Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...
.