George Desylla Zucco (11 January 1886 – 27 May 1960) was an English character actor who appeared, almost always in supporting roles, in 96 films during a career spanning two decades, from 1931 to 1951. In his horror film role he often played a suave villain.

Spouse: Stella Francis (1930-1960; his death); 1 child

Early life

Zucco was born in Manchester, Lancashire, England. His mother, Marian (née Rintoul), was English and ran a dressmaking business; it is claimed she was a former lady-in-waiting to Queen Victoria - but this is untrue as the honour was only accessible to titled ladies of high rank (duchesses, marchionesses, countesses, viscountesses, and baronesses). His father, George De Sylla Zucco, was a Greek merchant. He debuted on the Canadian stage in 1908. He and his wife Frances toured the American vaudeville circuit during the 1910s, their satirical sketch about suffragettes earning them renown.

He returned to Great Britain and served as a lieutenant in the British Army's West Yorkshire Regiment during World War I. He became a leading stage actor of the 1920s, and made his film debut in The Dreyfus Case (1931) as Eugène Godefroy Cavaignac, a British film dramatising the Dreyfus Affair. He and his wife had a daughter, Frances and a grandson George Zucco(née:Cantu)

Career

Zucco returned to the United States in 1935 to play Benjamin Disraeli alongside Helen Hayes in Victoria Regina, and appeared with Gary Cooper and George Raft in Souls at Sea (1937). His best known film role was that of Professor Moriarty in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939), opposite Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes and Nigel Bruce as Dr. Watson.

During the 1940s, he took every role he was offered, landing himself in B-films and Universal horror films, including The Mummy's Hand (1940), The Mummy's Tomb (1942), The Mad Monster (1942), The Mad Ghoul (1943), Dead Men Walk (1943), The Mummy's Ghost (1944), House of Frankenstein (1944), and Tarzan and the Mermaids (1948). He was reunited with Basil Rathbone in another Sherlock Holmes adventure, Sherlock Holmes in Washington, this time playing not Moriarty, but a Nazi spy.

Last years and death

He retired due to illness, after playing a bit part in David and Bathsheba (1951). Zucco died from pneumonia in an assisted-living facility nine years later at the age of 74. His daughter, Frances (1931-1962), died of throat cancer at age 30, and his widow died from natural causes in 1999 (at age 99). His grandson, George Zucco, lives in San Fernando Valley, CA.

Kenneth Anger, in his 1988 book Hollywood Babylon II, claimed that Zucco died in a madhouse, convinced that he was being haunted by H.P. Lovecraft's creation Cthulhu, and that Zucco's wife and adult daughter committed suicide in response to the loss, but this is unproven.