John Qualen
Birthday: 1899-12-06
Place of Birth: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Biography: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia John Qualen (born Johan Mandt Kvalen, December 8, 1899 – September 12, 1987) was a Canadian-American character actor of Norwegian heritage who specialized in Scandinavian roles. Qualen was born in Vancouver, British Columbia, the son of immigrants from Norway; his father was a Lutheran minister and changed the family's original surname, "Kvalen", to "Qualen" – though some sources give Oleson, later Oleson Kvalen as Qualen's earlier surnames. His father's ministering meant many moves and John was 20 when he graduated from Elgin High School in 1920. Though he was awarded a scholarship to Northwestern University after he won an oratory contest he never attended college. In a Milwaukee Journal interview he said he needed to start working and did so with the Chattaqua Circuit. Eventually reaching Broadway, he gained his big break as the Swedish janitor in Elmer Rice's Street Scene. His movie career began when he recreated the role in the film version. This was followed by his appearance in John Ford's Arrowsmith (1931) which began a more than thirty year membership in the director's "stock company", with important supporting roles in The Searchers (1956), Two Rode Together (1961), The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962) and Cheyenne Autumn (1964). Appearing in well over one hundred films, and acting extensively on television into the 1970s, Qualen performed many of his roles with various accents, usually Scandinavian, often intended for comic effect. Three of his more memorable roles showcase his versatility. Qualen assumed a Midwestern dialect as Muley, who recounts the destruction of his farm by the bank in Ford's The Grapes of Wrath (1940), and as the confused killer Earl Williams in Howard Hawks' classic comedy His Girl Friday (also 1940). As Berger, the jewelry-selling Norwegian resistance member in Michael Curtiz' Casablanca (1942), he essayed a light Scandinavian accent, but put on a thicker Mediterranean accent as the homeward-bound fisherman Locota in William Wellman's The High and the Mighty (1954) Qualen was treasurer of The Authors Club and historian of The Masquers, Hollywood's social group for actors. John Qualen was blind in his later years. He died of heart failure in 1987 in Torrance, California, and was interred in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale. He was survived by his three daughters.
Movies
Casablanca
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The Grapes of Wrath
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His Girl Friday
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The Searchers
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Youth Will Be Served
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My Girl Tisa
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Blondie on a Budget
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North to Alaska
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Jungle Book
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The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
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Hollow Triumph
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Out of the Fog
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A Patch of Blue
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Charlie Chan in Paris
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The Strange Case of Dr. Meade
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Woman on the Run
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7 Faces of Dr. Lao
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Dark Waters
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All That Money Can Buy
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Angels Over Broadway
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Those Calloways
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Arabian Nights
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A Big Hand for the Little Lady
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The Shepherd of the Hills
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The Fugitive
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I, the Jury
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Knute Rockne All American
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Cheyenne Autumn
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The Sons of Katie Elder
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Hans Christian Andersen
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The High and the Mighty
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Larceny, Inc.
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The Big Steal
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Revolt in the Big House
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The Long Voyage Home
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The Other Woman
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The Gun Runners
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The Jackpot
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The Impostor
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My World Dies Screaming
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Black Fury
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Angel's Holiday
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Million Dollar Baby
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Swing Shift Maisie
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Tortilla Flat
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Thunder Afloat
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Firecreek
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Honeymoon in Bali
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One More Spring
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Passion
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Our Daily Bread
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P.J.
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Goodbye, My Fancy
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Stand Up and Fight
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Roughly Speaking
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An American Romance
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Orchids to You
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Girls' Dormitory
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Arrowsmith
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Meet Nero Wolfe
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He Was Her Man
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Seventh Heaven
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The Farmer Takes a Wife
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Sing and Like It
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Five of a Kind
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Captain Kidd
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Hail, Hero!
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The Flying Missile
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Fit for a King
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Let's Fall in Love
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Chasing Yesterday
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Ski Patrol
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The Mad Miss Manton
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Counsellor at Law
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Upperworld
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365 Nights in Hollywood
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The Big Land
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The Country Doctor
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The Bad Man of Brimstone
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Man on a Bus
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Alias a Gentleman
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Reunion
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Street Scene
The setting is a city block during a sweltering summer, where the residents serve as representatives...
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Captain China
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Let's Fall in Love
A carnival girl pretends to be Swedish in order to win a movie role....
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Hi, Nellie!
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Two Rode Together
Two tough westerners bring home a group of settlers who have spent years as Comanche hostages....
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The Sea Chase
As the Second World War breaks out, German freighter captain Karl Ehrlich is about to leave Sydney, ...
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Four Wives
In this sequel to Four Daughters, Ann struggles to move on after the death of her husband as she fa...
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Let Us Live
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The Road to Glory
The story of trench life during World War I through the lives of a French regiment. As men are kille...
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Johnny Concho
In Johnny Concho, Frank Sinatra plays a man who goes from the town bully to town coward!...
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Man of Iron
A construction company foreman's life changes--not necessarily for the better--when he is promoted t...
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On Their Own
The Jones family (without father) head for California to open a bungalow court. To increase business...
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Donovan's Reef
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Thunder in the Night
Officer Karl Torok's best friend, Count Alvinczy, is elected president of the Hungarian cabinet. Mea...
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Anatomy of a Murder
Semi-retired Michigan lawyer Paul Biegler takes the case of Army Lt. Manion, who murdered a local in...
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Reaching from Heaven
Just as church services are letting out, a shabbily-dressed stranger is run over by an automobile in...
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Babies for Sale
A determined newsman pursues his hunch that a charitable maternity hospital is running a ruthless ad...
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Unchained
This fact-based prison drama tells the tale of a band of prisoners living in the innovative 2,600-ac...
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Ambush at Tomahawk Gap
Hodiak, Brian, Derek and Teal have just been released from prison. They return to Tomahawk Gap, now ...
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Ring Around the Moon
Despite being in love with coworker Kay Duncan, high-flying newspaperman Ross Graham winds up engage...
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Wife vs. Secretary
Linda, the wife of a publishing executive, suspects that her husband Van’s relationship with his att...
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The Three Musketeers
In 17th century France, young d'Artagnan wants to join the King's Musketeers, but instead befriends ...
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Saturday's Children
An inventor and his bride get testy in the city as they try to make ends meet....
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Nothing Sacred
When a small-town girl is incorrectly diagnosed with a rare, deadly disease, an unknowing newspaper ...
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Hell Bent for Leather
When Clay Santell stops in the town of Sutterville after having his horse stolen, he is mistaken by ...
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Doubting Thomas
A husband makes fun of his wife's theatrical aspirations when she agrees to appear in a local produc...
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Whipsaw
Hot jewels from London make their way to New York, where they are stolen by racketeer Ed Dexter, who...
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Belle Le Grand
Upon her release from prison for a murder she didn't commit, a woman finds that her younger sister h...
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I'll Take Sweden
Bob Holcomb will do anything to stop his daughter JoJo from tying the knot with her lazy boyfriend, ...
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Straight Is the Way
Just out of prison, Benny Horowitz tries to go straight. Things are complicated by his former girlfr...
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The Prize
A group of Nobel laureates descends on Stockholm to accept their awards. Among them is American nove...
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Buccaneer's Girl
A New Orleans performer loves a pirate who robs only from the shipowner who ruined his father....
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New Wine
The romantic story of Franz Schubert 's fight for recognition of his music. The 1941 Reinhold Schun...
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Elmer Gantry
A charismatic charlatan begins a business — and eventually romantic — relationship with a roadside e...
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Fifty Roads to Town
A man on the lam in the Canadian wilds encounters a young woman in a remote lodge who is also on the...
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The Chaser
A sleazy lawyer gains clients by showing up at terrible accidents. His boss, determined to stop him,...
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She Had to Eat
An Arizona gas station owner faces comic adventures after traveling with an eccentric millionaire to...
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Silk Hat Kid
Eddie Howard, a fast-thinking, two-fisted bodyguard, is hired by nightclub-owner Tim Martin to prote...
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River Gang
An orphan girl lives with apparently kind uncle who turns out to be a murderer....
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Joy of Living
Falling in love with the voice of Broadway chanteuse Margaret Garret, cocksure young tycoon Daniel B...
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The Great Hotel Murder
Crime novelist Roger Blackwood competes with hotel house detective Andy McCabe in solving a murder b...
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La Classe américaine
George Abitbol, the classiest man in the world, dies tragically during a cruise. The director of an ...
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At Gunpoint
A general-store keeper scares off bank robbers with a lucky shot, but they come back....
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Mickey the Kid
A bank robber and his boy make a run for it during winter in a bus full of children....
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Servants' Entrance
Heiress Hedda Nillson certain that her family is about to lose all its money, takes a job as a maid....
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Breakdowns of 1942
Flubs and bloopers that occurred on the set of some of the major Warner Bros. pictures of 1942....
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Doc
An aging doctor in a small town decides to pack up his little black bag, but when a young doctor ass...
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Getting Away from It All
Two city couples decide to leave the hectic urban life and retreat to the country, but find that rur...
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Frasier, the Sensuous Lion
A telepathic lion teaches an awkward zoologist how to love....
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