Everett Sloane

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Everett Sloane (October 1, 1909 – August 6, 1965) was a television and movie actor. Sloane is probably best known for his supporting role playing Mr. Bernstein in the cinema classic Citizen Kane.

Sloane was born to a Jewish family in Manhattan and attended the University of Pennsylvania before dropping out in order to join a theater company, but he stopped acting and became a runner on Wall Street after a number of negative stage reviews. After the stock market crash in 1929, he decided to return to the theater. Sloane eventually joined Orson Welles's Mercury Theater, and he remained a Mercury actor and acted in Welles's films in roles such as Citizen Kane 's "Bernstein" in 1941, through The Lady from Shanghai's "Arthur Bannister" in 1948.

Sloane also worked extensively in television; he was the voice of Dick Tracy in 130 cartoons produced in 1960 and 1961. Beginning in 1964, he provided character voices for the animated TV series The Adventures of Jonny Quest. He reportedly wrote the unused lyrics to "The Fishin' Hole", the theme song for The Andy Griffith Show. He starred as the ruthless businessman in both the film and television versions of Rod Serling's Patterns.

Sloane committed suicide at 55, reportedly depressed over oncoming blindness.