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Jeff Corey

Jeff Corey
Jeff Corey
Born: Aug 10, 1914 in New York City, New York
Died: Aug 16, 2002 in Malibu, California
Occupation: Actor
Active: '40s-'90s
Major Genres: Drama, Western
Career Highlights: Seconds, Home of the Brave, Superman and the Mole Men
First Major Screen Credit: My Friend Flicka (1943)
23 Videos for Jeff Corey
Surviving the Game (1994) Messenger of Death (1988) Oh, God! (1977)
Beethoven's 2nd (1993) Kidnapped (1987) Catlow (1971)
Judas Project (1993) Creator (1985) Little Big Man (1970)
Ruby Cairo (1992) Conan the Destroyer (1984) Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
Sinatra (1992) The Sword and the Sorcerer (1982) True Grit (1969)
Sinatra (1992) Battle Beyond the Stars (1980) Wake of the Red Witch (1949)
Bird on a Wire (1990) Butch and Sundance: The Early Days (1979) Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman (1942)
The Rose and the Jackal (1990) The Wild Geese (1978)
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Biography:

American actor Jeff Corey forsook a job as sewing-machine salesman for the less stable world of New York theatre in the 1930s. The 26-year-old Corey was regarded as a valuable character-actor commodity when he arrived in Hollywood in 1940. Perhaps the best of his many early unbilled appearances was in the Kay Kyser film You'll Find Out (40), in which Corey, playing a game-show contestant (conveniently named Jeff Corey), was required to sing a song while stuffing his mouth full of crackers.

The actor was busiest during the film noir mid-to-late 1940s, playing several weasely villain roles; it is hard to forget the image of Corey, in the role of a slimy stoolie in Burt Lancaster's Brute Force, being tied to the front of a truck and pushed directly into a hail of police bullets. Corey's film career ended abruptly in 1952 when he was unfairly blacklisted for his left-leaning political beliefs.

To keep food on the table, Corey became an acting coach, eventually running one of the top training schools in the business (among his more famous pupils was Jack Nicholson). He was permitted to return to films in the 1960s, essaying such roles as a wild-eyed wino in Lady in a Cage (64), the louse who kills Kim Darby's father in True Grit (68), and a sympathetic sheriff in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (68).

In addition to his film work, Jeff Corey has acted in and directed numerous TV series; he was seen as a regular on the 1985 Robert Blake series Hell Town and the 1986 Earl Hamner Jr. production Morningstar/Eveningstar. The following decade found Corey appearing in such films as Sinatra (1992), Beethoven's 2nd (1993) and the {/action thriller} Surviving the Game (1994).

Shortly after suffering a fall at his Malibu home in August of 2002, Corey died in Santa Monica due to complications resulting from the accident. He was 88. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide.