William King Baggot was an American actor, film director and screenwriter.
29 Facts About King Baggot
2.
King Baggot was an internationally famous movie star of the silent film era.
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King Baggot directed William S Hart in his most famous western, Tumbleweeds.
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King Baggot was born in St Louis, Missouri, the son of William Baggot and Harriet M "Hattie" King.
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King Baggot's siblings were Amos Taylor Baggot ; Thomas Gantt Baggot ; John Marmaduke Baggot ; Arthur Lee Baggot ; Marion L Baggot ; and Harriet D Baggot.
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King Baggot's father was born in Ireland, and emigrated from County Limerick to the United States in 1852.
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King Baggot was a prominent St Louis real estate agent.
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King Baggot attended Christian Brothers College High School, a prominent Catholic all-male secondary school, where he excelled at sports, was a star soccer and baseball player, and became captain of the soccer team.
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In 1894, King left St Louis and went to Chicago, where he worked as a clerk for his uncle, Edward Baggot, whose business sold plumbing, gas and electric fixtures.
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King Baggot soon helped found another amateur theatrical group, the Players Club of St Louis.
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King Baggot began his career on the stage in a Shakespearean stock company and toured throughout the US Following his first engagement, he performed under the management of Liebler and Company, one of the foremost producing companies at that time.
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King Baggot toured under the management of Frohman, and the Shuberts, and played five weeks in New York in The Queen of the Highway.
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King Baggot was amused at the violent gestures and jumping around of the players, taking none of it seriously.
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King Baggot became interested in the fledgling industry and later decided to give it a try and turn picture player.
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King Baggot starred in at least 42 movies opposite Lawrence from 1909 to 1911.
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King Baggot began writing screenplays and directing, all the while becoming a major star internationally.
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King Baggot starred as Wilfred of Ivanhoe in Ivanhoe, a feature length adventure drama that was filmed on location in England and at Chepstow Castle in Wales.
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King Baggot played the role of Jean Dumas in the drama Absinthe, which was filmed in Paris.
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King Baggot starred in the role as Harrison Grant in the 20-part spy thriller The Eagle's Eye opposite Marguerite Snow, an adaptation of former FBI Director William J Flynn's experiences that was produced by Leopold and Theodore Wharton, and as Sheldon Steele in the crime drama The Hawk's Trail opposite Grace Darmond.
20.
King Baggot directed Mary Philbin and William Haines in the romance The Gaiety Girl.
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King Baggot formed his own production company, King Baggot Productions, and produced and directed The Home Maker, a drama starring Clive Brook and Alice Joyce about the reversal of traditional roles between a husband and wife, which was released through Universal.
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That same year, Baggot directed William S Hart in his most famous western, Tumbleweeds, a drama about the Oklahoma land rush of 1893.
23.
King Baggot filed on grounds of desertion, stating in the complaint that he was a bad example to their son.
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King Baggot said he would return home after drinking and be in a boisterous mood.
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King Baggot turned to playing character roles, bit parts and even jobs as an extra, and appeared in scores of movies in that capacity through the 1930s and 1940s, including Mississippi.
26.
King Baggot played the uncredited role as a policeman on the street in Bad Sister, which starred Conrad Nagel and Sidney Fox, with Bette Davis in her first movie role.
27.
King Baggot had the role as Henry Field, a movie director, in the Monogram Pictures drama Police Court co-starring Henry B Walthall, which told the story of a has-been alcoholic actor trying to make a comeback.
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King Baggot died at age 68 from a stroke at a sanatorium in Los Angeles.
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King Baggot is interred in Calvary Cemetery, East Los Angeles.