1. Leo Bernard Gorcey was an American stage and film actor, famous for portraying the leader of a group of hooligans known variously as the Dead End Kids, the East Side Kids, and as adults, The Bowery Boys.
23 Facts About Leo Gorcey
1. 2.
Leo Gorcey was born in New York City on June 3,1917, the son of Josephine, an Irish Catholic immigrant, and Bernard Leo Gorcey, a Russian Jewish immigrant.
3.
Leo Gorcey had just lost a job as a plumber's apprentice and wished to emulate his father's modest success.
4.
The Leo Gorcey boys were cast in small roles as two members of the East 53rd Place Gang in the play Dead End by Sidney Kingsley.
5.
Leo Gorcey created the stage persona of a quarrelsome guttersnipe whose greatest joy was to make trouble.
6.
Leo Gorcey became one of the busiest actors in Hollywood during the following 20 years, starring in seven Dead End Kids films between 1937 and 1939,21 East Side Kids films between 1940 and 1945, and 41 The Bowery Boys films between 1946 and 1955.
7.
In 1944, Leo Gorcey took a recurring role on the Pabst Blue Ribbon Town radio show, starring Groucho Marx.
8.
Leo Gorcey had a small role in a 1948 film, the comedy So This Is New York, starring radio comedians Henry Morgan and Arnold Stang, which was Gorcey's last appearance as a straight character actor.
9.
Leo Gorcey walked out on Katzman, and Katzman discontinued the series.
10.
Leo Gorcey brought aboard his father, Bernard Leo Gorcey, to appear as Louie Dumbrowski, the panicky owner of a sweet shop where the boys gathered, as well as his brother David to play one of the gang members.
11.
The series was immediately successful, and Leo Gorcey starred in four Bowery Boys films per year through 1955.
12.
Leo Gorcey, devastated, began abusing alcohol and lost a great deal of weight.
13.
Leo Gorcey had a bit part in the 1963 comedy It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, and he appeared with old sidekick Huntz Hall in a pair of low-budget films, Second Fiddle to a Steel Guitar in 1966 and The Phynx, released in 1970 after his death.
14.
Leo Gorcey made an appearance in a television commercial for a 1969 Pontiac model.
15.
In 1967, Leo Gorcey self-published an autobiography, An Original Dead-End Kid Presents: Dead End Yells, Wedding Bells, Cockle Shells, and Dizzy Spells, which was limited to 1,000 copies.
16.
In May 1939, Leo Gorcey married 15-year-old dancer Kay Marvis, who appeared in four of his Monogram movies.
17.
Leo Gorcey married actress Evalene Bankston in October 1945, but they divorced two years later.
18.
Leo Gorcey was arrested for firing a gun at his wife when she entered his home in Van Nuys, California, but was acquitted of the charge in 1948.
19.
In February 1949, Leo Gorcey married actress Amelita Ward, with whom he had appeared in Clancy Street Boys and Smugglers' Cove.
20.
Leo Gorcey was married to Mary Gannon on July 12,1968, until his death, nearly one year later.
21.
Leo Gorcey is buried at Molinos Cemetery in Los Molinos, California.
22.
In 1967, Leo Gorcey's image was to appear in the crowd of celebrities on the cover of the Beatles' album Sgt.
23.
Me and the Dead End Kid, a book about Gorcey written by his son Leo, Jr.