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Lionel Stander
Stander inA Star Is Born (1937)
Born	Lionel Jay Stander (1908-01-11)January 11, 1908 New York City, U.S.
Died	November 30, 1994(1994-11-30) (aged 86) Los Angeles,California, U.S.
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1928–1994
Spouses	Lucy Dietz ​ ​ (m. 1928; div. 1936)​ Alice Twitchell ​ ​ (m. 1938; div. 1942)​ Vehanne Monteagle ​ ​ (m. 1945; div. 1950)​ Diana Radbec ​ ​ (m. 1953; div. 1963)​ Maria Penn ​ ​ (m. 1963; div. 1967)​ Stephanie Van Hennick ​ ​ (m. 1971)​
Children	6

Lionel Jay Stander (January 11, 1908 – November 30, 1994) was an American actor, activist, and a founding member of theScreen Actors Guild. He had an extensive career in theatre, film, radio, and television that spanned nearly 70 years, from 1928 until 1994. He was known for his distinctive raspy voice and tough-guy demeanor, as well as for his vocalleft-wing political stances. One of the first Hollywood actors to besubpoenaed before theHouse Un-American Activities Committee, he wasblacklisted from the late 1940s until the mid-1960s.

Following his experience with the Hollywood Blacklist, Stander moved to Europe, where he appeared in manygenre films, including severalSpaghetti Westerns. He returned to the United States later in the decade, playing the role of themajordomo Max on the 1980s mystery television seriesHart to Hart, earning him aGolden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Series, Miniseries or Television Film.

Stander was born inThe Bronx,New York City on 11 January 1908, to parents ofRussian Jewish extraction.

During his one year at theUniversity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, he appeared in the student productionsThe Muse of the Unpublished Writer,^[1] andThe Muse and the Movies: A Comedy of Greenwich Village.

Stander's acting career began in 1928, as Cop and First Fairy inHim byE. E. Cummings, at theProvincetown Playhouse.^[2] He claimed that he got the roles because one of them required shootingcraps, which he did well, and a friend in the company volunteered him. He appeared in a series of short-lived plays through the early 1930s, includingThe House Beautiful, whichDorothy Parker famously derided as "the play lousy".^[3]

Like many New York-based stage actors, Stander found additional work in movie short subjects filmed in New York. He signed withVitaphone and was featured (without screen credit) in the two-reel comedyIn the Dough (1933), withRoscoe Arbuckle andShemp Howard. He made several other Vitaphone comedies, usually as a comic tough guy, villain, or authority figure; his last Vitaphone short wasThe Old Grey Mayor (1935) withBob Hope in 1935. That same year, he was cast in a feature,Ben Hecht'sThe Scoundrel (1935), withNoël Coward. He moved toHollywood and signed a contract withColumbia Pictures. Stander was in a string of films over the next three years, appearing most notably inFrank Capra'sMr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936) withGary Cooper,Meet Nero Wolfe (1936) playingArchie Goodwin,The League of Frightened Men (1937), andA Star Is Born (1937) withJanet Gaynor andFredric March.^{[citation needed]}

Stander's distinctive rumbling voice, tough-guy demeanor, and talent with accents made him a popular radio actor. In the 1930s and 1940s, he was onThe Eddie Cantor Show,Bing Crosby'sKMH show, theLux Radio Theater production ofA Star Is Born,The Fred Allen Show,^[4] theMayor of the Town series withLionel Barrymore andAgnes Moorehead,Kraft Music Hall onNBC,Stage Door Canteen onCBS, theLincoln Highway Radio Show on NBC, andThe Jack Paar Show, among others.

In 1941, he starred in a short-lived radio show calledThe Life of Riley on CBS (no relation to the radio, film, and television character later made famous byWilliam Bendix). Stander played the role of Spider Schultz in bothHarold Lloyd's filmThe Milky Way (1936) and its remake ten years later,The Kid from Brooklyn (1946), starringDanny Kaye. He was a regular on Danny Kaye's zany comedy-varietyradio show on CBS (1946–1947), playing himself as "just the elevator operator" amidst the antics of Kaye, futureOur Miss Brooks starEve Arden, and bandleaderHarry James.^{[citation needed]}

Also during the 1940s, he played several characters onThe Woody Woodpecker andAndy Panda animated theatrical shorts, produced byWalter Lantz Productions. ForWoody Woodpecker, he provided the voice ofBuzz Buzzard, but was blacklisted from the Lantz studio in 1951 and was replaced byDal McKennon.

Stander espoused a variety of social and political causes, and was a founding member of theScreen Actors Guild. At a SAG meeting held during a 1937 studio technicians' strike, he told the assemblage of 2000 members: "With the eyes of the whole world on this meeting, will it not give the Guild a black eye if its members continue to cross picket lines?" (TheNY Times reported: "Cheers mingled with boos greeted the question.") Stander also supported the Conference of Studio Unions in its fight against the Mob-influenced International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE). Also in 1937, Ivan F. Cox, a deposed officer of the San Francisco longshoremen's union, sued Stander and a host of others, including union leaderHarry Bridges, actorsFredric March,Franchot Tone,Mary Astor,James Cagney,Jean Muir, and directorWilliam Dieterle. The charge, according toTime magazine, was "conspiring to propagate Communism on the Pacific Coast, causing Mr. Cox to lose his job".^{[citation needed]}

During theSpanish Civil War, Stander fundraised for theRepublican cause. He also campaigned for the release of theScottsboro Boys.^[5] He was a member of thePopular Front from 1936 until 1939, and subsequently belonged to theHollywood Anti-Nazi League. Regarding his political beliefs, Stander once described himself as "lefter than the Left" and said he supported theCommunist Party USA prior to theMolotov–Ribbentrop Pact (which he opposed). As he later put it, "I worked very closely with the Communist Party during the 30's. But I never joined."^[5]

In 1938, Columbia Pictures headHarry Cohn allegedly called Stander "a Red son of a bitch" and threatened a US$100,000 fine against any studio that renewed his contract. Despite critical acclaim for his performances, Stander's film work dropped off drastically. After appearing in 15 films in 1935 and 1936, he was in only six in 1937 and 1938. This was followed by just six films from 1939 through 1943, none made by major studios, the most notable beingGuadalcanal Diary (1943).^{[citation needed]}

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In 1940, Stander was among the first group of Hollywood actors to besubpoenaed before theHouse Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) for supposed Communist activities.^[6] At a grand jury hearing inLos Angeles in August 1940—the transcript of which was leaked to the press—John L. Leech, the self-described former "chief functionary" of the L.A. Communist Party, named Stander as a CP member, along with more than 15 other Hollywood notables, includingFranchot Tone,Humphrey Bogart,James Cagney,Luise Rainer,Clifford Odets andBudd Schulberg. Stander subsequently forced himself into the grand jury hearing, and the district attorney cleared him of the allegations.^[7]

Stander appeared in few films in 1944 and 1945. Then, with HUAC's attentions focused elsewhere due to World War II, he played in a number of mostly second-rate pictures from independent studios through the late 1940s. These include Ben Hecht'sSpecter of the Rose (1946); thePreston Sturges comedyThe Sin of Harold Diddlebock (1947) withHarold Lloyd; andTrouble Makers (1948) withThe Bowery Boys. One classic emerged from this period of his career, the Preston Sturges comedyUnfaithfully Yours (1948) withRex Harrison.

In 1947, HUAC turned its attention once again to Hollywood. That October, Howard Rushmore, who had belonged to the CPUSA in the 1930s and written film reviews for theDaily Worker, testified that writerJohn Howard Lawson, whom he named as a Communist, had "referred to Lionel Stander as a perfect example of how a Communist should not act in Hollywood." Stander was againblacklisted from films, though he played on TV, radio, and in the theater.^[8]

In March 1951, actorLarry Parks, after pleading with HUAC investigators not to force him to "crawl through the mud" as an informer, named several people as Communists in a "closed-door session", which made the newspapers two days later. He testified that he knew Stander, but did not recall attending any CP meetings with him.^[9]

At a HUAC hearing in April 1951, actorMarc Lawrence named Stander as a member of his Hollywood Communist "cell", along with screenwritersLester Cole andGordon Kahn.^[10] Lawrence testified that Stander "was the guy who introduced me to the party line", and that Stander said that by joining the CP, he would "get to know the dames more"^[11] — which Lawrence, who did not enjoy film-star looks, thought a good idea. Upon hearing of this, Stander shot off a telegram to HUAC chair John S. Wood, calling Lawrence's testimony "ridiculous" and asking to appear before the Committee so that Stander could swear under oath he was not a Communist. The telegram concluded: "I respectfully request an opportunity to appear before you at your earliest possible convenience. Be assured of my cooperation." He also brought a slander lawsuit against Lawrence, which Stander later described in a 1983 interview:

I consulted a New York lawyer and sued Marc Lawrence in the state courts of New York, and the judge ruled that if he repeated what he had said on the stand away from the stand, I had a viable suit. But he enjoyed congressional immunity on the stand. Evidently, Marc Lawrence had a lawyer, too, because as soon as he finished making his statements, he left for Europe. That was it for the lawsuit.^[12]

After Lawrence's 1951 testimony, Stander was blacklisted from TV and radio. He continued to act in theater roles, and played Ludlow Lowell in the 1952-53 revival ofPal Joey on Broadway and on tour.

Two years passed before Stander was issued the requested subpoena. Finally, in May 1953, he testified at a HUAC hearing in New York, where he made nationwide front-page headlines by being uproariously uncooperative, memorialized in theEric Bentley play,Are You Now or Have You Ever Been. TheNew York Times headline was "Stander Lectures House Red Inquiry." In a dig at bandleaderArtie Shaw, who had tearfully claimed in a Committee hearing that he had been "duped" by the Communist Party, Stander asserted:

"And I am not a dupe, or a dope, or a moe, or a schmoe, and everything I did—I was absolutely conscious of what I was doing, and I am not ashamed of everything I said in public or private".^[13]

An excerpt from that statement was engraved in stone for "The First Amendment Blacklist Memorial" byJenny Holzer at theUniversity of Southern California.

Other notable statements during Stander's 1953 HUAC testimony:

• "[Testifying before HUAC] is like the Spanish Inquisition. You may not be burned, but you can't help coming away a little singed."
• "I don't know about the overthrow of the government. This committee has been investigating 15 years so far, and hasn't found one act of violence."
• "I know of a group of fanatics who are desperately trying to undermine the Constitution of the United States by depriving artists and others of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness without due process of law... I can tell names and cite instances and I am one of the first victims of it. And if you are interested in that and also a group of ex-fascists and America-Firsters and anti-Semites, people who hate everybody including Negroes, minority groups and most likely themselves... and these people are engaged in a conspiracy outside all the legal processes to undermine the very fundamental American concepts upon which our entire system of democracy exists."^[14]
• "...I don't want to be responsible for a whole stable of informers, stool pigeons, and psychopaths and ex-political heretics, who come in here beating their breast and say, 'I am awfully sorry; I didn't know what I was doing. Please--I want absolution; get me back into pictures.'"
• "My estimation of this committee is that this committee arrogates judicial and punitive powers which it does not possess."

Stander also denied having been a Communist "now or yesterday." But when asked if he had ever been a party member, he refused to answer, calling it "atrick question."^{[citation needed]}

Stander was blacklisted from the late 1940s until 1965; perhaps the longest period.^[14]

After that, Stander's acting career went into a free fall. He worked as a stockbroker onWall Street, a journeyman stage actor, a corporate spokesman—even aNew OrleansMardi Gras king. He didn't return toBroadway until 1961 (and then only briefly in a flop) and to film in 1963, in the low-budgetThe Moving Finger (although he did provide, uncredited, the voice-over narration for the 1961 film noirBlast of Silence.)

Life improved for Stander when he moved to London in 1964 to act inBertolt Brecht'sSaint Joan of the Stockyards, directed byTony Richardson, for whom he'd acted on Broadway, along withChristopher Plummer, in a 1963 production of Brecht'sThe Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui. In 1965, he was featured in the filmPromise Her Anything. That same year Richardson cast him in theblack comedy about the funeral industry,The Loved One, based onthe novel byEvelyn Waugh, with an all-star cast includingJonathan Winters,Robert Morse,Liberace,Rod Steiger,Paul Williams and many others. In 1966,Roman Polanski cast Stander in his only starring role, as the thug Dickie inCul-de-sac, oppositeFrançoise Dorléac andDonald Pleasence.

Stander stayed in Europe and eventually settled in Rome, where he appeared in manyspaghetti Westerns, most notably playing a bartender named Max inSergio Leone'sOnce Upon a Time in the West. He played the role of the villainous mob boss inFernando Di Leo's 1972poliziottesco thrillerCaliber 9. In Rome he connected withRobert Wagner, who cast him in an episode ofIt Takes a Thief that was shot there. Stander's few English-language films in the 1970s includeThe Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight withRobert De Niro andJerry Orbach,Steven Spielberg's1941, andMartin Scorsese'sNew York, New York, which also starred De Niro andLiza Minnelli.

Stander played a supporting role in the TV filmRevenge Is My Destiny withChris Robinson. He played a lounge comic modeled after the real-life Las Vegas comicJoe E. Lewis, who used to begin his act by announcing "Post Time" as he sipped his ever-present drink.

After 15 years abroad, Stander moved back to the U.S. for the role he is now most famous for: Max, the loyal butler, cook, and chauffeur to the wealthy, amateur detectives Jonathan and Jennifer Hart played byRobert Wagner andStefanie Powers on the 1979–1984 television seriesHart to Hart (and a subsequent series ofHart to Hart made-for-television films). In 1982, Stander won aGolden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Series, Miniseries or Television Film.

In 1986, he became the voice of Kup inThe Transformers: The Movie. In 1991 he was a guest star in the television seriesDream On, playing Uncle Pat in the episode "Toby or Not Toby". His final theatrical film role was as a dying hospital patient inThe Last Good Time (1994), withArmin Mueller-Stahl andOlivia d'Abo, directed byBob Balaban.

Stander died oflung cancer in Los Angeles, California, in 1994 at age 86.^{[citation needed]}

Wikimedia Commons has media related toLionel Stander.

• Lionel Stander atIMDb
• Lionel Stander at theInternet Broadway Database
• Lionel Stander atFind a Grave
• Lionel Stander: A Hollywood Story
• LIONEL STANDER: He Wasn't Afraid of John Wayne…Or Anyone Else
• Lionel Stander portrait as a young man NY Public Library Billy Rose collection

• 1908 births
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