People named Claude Rains

Claude L Rains of Greenbrier, Faulkner County, Arkansas was born on October 14, 1904, and died at age 73 years old in January 1978.

Career In London theatre, he achieved success in the title role of John Drinkwater's play Ulysses S. Grant, the follow-up to the same playwright's Abraham Lincoln. Rains portrayed Faulkland in Richard Brinsley Sheridan's The Rivals, presented at London's Lyric Theatre in 1925. He returned to New York City in 1927 and appeared in nearly 20 Broadway roles, in plays which included George Bernard Shaw's The Apple Cart and dramatisations of The Constant Nymph and Pearl S. Buck's novel The Good Earth (as a Chinese farmer). Rains with Miriam Hopkins in Camel Through the Needle's Eye on Broadway, New York City, 1929 Although he had played the single supporting role in the silent, Build Thy House (1920), Rains came relatively late to film acting. While working for the Theatre Guild, he was offered a screen test with Universal Pictures in 1932. His screen test for A Bill of Divorcement (1932) for a New York representative of RKO was a failure but, according to some accounts, led to his being cast in the title role of James Whale's The Invisible Man (1933) after his screen test and unique voice were inadvertently overheard from the next room. His agent, Harold Freedman, was a family friend of Carl Laemmle, who controlled Universal Pictures at the time, and had been acquainted with Rains in London and was keen to cast him in the role. According to Rains' daughter, this was the only film of his he ever saw. He also did not go to see the rushes of the day's filming "because he told me, every time he went he was horrified by his huge face on the huge screen, that he just never went back again." Rains signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. on 27 November 1935 with Warner able to exercise the right to loan him to other studios and Rains having a potential income of up to $750,000 over seven years.[16] He played the villainous role of Prince John in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). Roddy McDowall once asked Rains if he had intentionally lampooned Bette Davis in his performance as Prince John, and Rains' only smiled "an enigmatic smile." Rains later revealed to his daughter that he'd enjoyed playing the prince as a homosexual, by using subtle mannerisms. Rains later credited the film's co-director Michael Curtiz with teaching him the more understated requirements of film acting, or "what not to do in front of a camera." On loan to Columbia Pictures, he portrayed a corrupt U.S. senator in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), for which he received his first Academy Award nomination as Best Supporting Actor. For Warner Bros., he played Dr. Alexander Tower, who commits murder-suicide to spare his daughter a life of insanity in Kings Row (1942) and the cynical police chief Captain Renault in Casablanca (also 1942). On loan again, Rains played the title character in Universal's remake of Phantom of the Opera (1943).

Claude Rains of Mesa, Maricopa County, AZ was born on July 19, 1933, and died at age 74 years old on August 30, 2007.

Claude R Rains of Pinesdale, Ravalli County, MT was born on May 20, 1920, and died at age 73 years old on November 5, 1993.

Claude Rains of Fort Collins, Larimer County, Colorado was born on November 7, 1886, and died at age 86 years old in February 1973.

Claude Rains of Springfield, Greene County, Missouri was born on August 14, 1897, and died at age 69 years old in August 1966.

Claude Rains of Springfield, Greene County, Missouri was born on March 24, 1898, and died at age 81 years old in March 1979.

Claude R Rains of Sioux City, Woodbury County, IA was born on July 15, 1912, and died at age 83 years old on September 18, 1995.

Claude Rains of Texas was born on May 9, 1901, and died at age 72 years old in December 1973.

Claude Rains of Crockett, Houston County, Texas was born on January 28, 1906, and died at age 69 years old in August 1975.

Claude L Rains of Natchitoches, Natchitoches County, LA was born on February 1, 1903, and died at age 89 years old on July 23, 1992.

Claude Rains of Williamsburg, Whitley County, KY was born on May 15, 1946, and died at age 54 years old on September 8, 2000.

Claude P Rains of Blacksburg, Cherokee County, SC was born on February 6, 1905, and died at age 91 years old on November 18, 1996.

Claude Rains was born on March 20, 1923, and died at age 52 years old in November 1975. Family, friend, or fan, this family history biography is for you to remember Claude Rains.

Claude Rains of Illinois was born on August 14, 1896, and died at age 66 years old in January 1963.