Lucien Littlefield


Lucien Littlefield was an American actor who achieved a long career from silent films to the television era. He was noted for his versatility, playing a wide range of roles and already portraying old men before he was of voting age.

Life and career

Lucien Littlefield was born in San Antonio, Texas, started his film career in 1914 and worked as an actor right until his death in 1960. He usually portrayed comedic supporting characters, often much older than himself. His role of the doctor in The Cat and the Canary is one of his more notable performances. The character actor appeared with Laurel and Hardy, first as an eccentric professor in Dirty Work, and finally as a veterinarian in their classic feature Sons of the Desert, both made in 1933. He also played Mary Pickford's father in My Best Girl in 1927. Other roles include the western Tumbleweeds with William S. Hart, the comedy Ruggles of Red Gap with Charles Laughton, and Johnny Come Lately with James Cagney.
He played an eccentric inventor in an early Adventures of Superman episode called "The Runaway Robot". Littlefield played many character roles in other TV shows of the 1950s, such as Blondie, Lassie, Dragnet and Peter Gunn.
He died of natural causes in 1960 at a veterans' hospital in Hollywood, California, and was buried in Glendale's Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery.

Selected filmography