William Demarest Trailers
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Carl William Demarest (February 27, 1892 – December 27, 1983) was an American character actor, known for playing Uncle Charley in My Three Sons. A veteran of World War I, Demarest became a prolific film and television actor, appearing in over 140 films, beginning in 1926 and ending in the 1970s. He frequently played crusty but good-hearted roles. Demarest started in show business working in vaudeville, appearing with his wife Estelle Collette (real name Esther Zychlin) as "Demarest and Colette", then moved on to Broadway. Demarest worked regularly with director Preston Sturges, becoming part of a "stock" troupe of actors that Sturges repeatedly cast in his films. He appeared in ten films written by Sturges, eight of which were under his direction, including The Lady Eve, Sullivan's Travels and The Miracle of Morgan's Creek. Demarest was such a familiar figure at the Paramount studio that just his name was used in the movie Sunset Boulevard as a potential star for William Holden's unsold baseball screenplay.
Demarest appeared with veteran western film star Roscoe Ates in the 1958 episode "And the Desert Shall Blossom" of CBS's Alfred Hitchcock Presents. In the story line, Ates and Demarest appear as old timers living in the Nevada desert. The local sheriff, played by Ben Johnson, appears with an eviction notice, but he agrees to let the pair stay on their property if they can make a dead rosebush bloom within the next month.
In 1959 Demarest was named the lead actor of the 18-week sitcom Love and Marriage on NBC in the 1959–1960 season. Demarest played William Harris, the owner of a failing music company who refuses to handle popular rock and roll music, which presumably might save the firm from bankruptcy. Joining Demarest on the series were Jeanne Bal, Murray Hamilton and Stubby Kaye.
Demarest appeared as Police Chief Aloysius of the Santa Rosita Police Department in the film It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963), as well as on a memorable episode ("What's in the Box") of Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone as a hen-pecked husband driven to the murder of his wife.
His most famous television role was in the ABC and then CBS sitcom My Three Sons from 1965 to 1972, playing Uncle Charley O'Casey. He replaced William Frawley, whose failing health had made procuring insurance impossible. Demarest had worked with Fred MacMurray previously in the films Hands Across the Table (1935), Pardon My Past (1945), On Our Merry Way (1948), and The Far Horizons (1955) and was a personal friend of MacMurray. Also, he worked with Irene Dunne in Never a Dull Moment (1950).
Most Popular William Demarest Trailers
Total trailers found: 145
26 April 1937
Agent Pete Garland is fired by society singer Monica Barrett after he got her a new radio contract, because she thinks her lawyer friend Teddy Leeds fits in better with her social status.
02 December 1938
Trouble-prone Billy Peck and his gang descend on a traveling circus that has just hit town, and before long their antics are causing the circus owner all kinds of problems.
17 February 1939
Mason is a former race-horse owner who gave up everything and started to drink after the death of one of his jockeys.
10 October 1946
At the turn of the 20th century, young Asa Yoelson decides to go against the wishes of his cantor father and pursue a career in show business.
19 December 1978
Three people's lives are drastically changed when they are suddenly given one million dollars each by an eccentric billionaire in this pilot to a prospective new series which the producers hoped would equal the success of the original one that ran from 1955 to 1960.
12 June 1942
The Army takes a bandleader (Kay Kyser) away from his bride (Ellen Drew) and sends him on a spy mission with a woman (Jane Wyman).
09 December 1942
Kathy lives in a cramped New York flat with her father Madden Thomas, a celebrated actor brought down by drink.
25 November 1930
The heir to a fortune will only receive his inheritance if he spends the night in a supposedly haunted house.
20 October 1955
A spirited dressmaker's small store flourishes into a business empire in the midst of the Texas oil boom of the 1940s.
30 September 1945
A girl is desperate to get to Washington D.C. to be with her lonesome brother, a wounded G.I. She persuades Bing Crosby to let her join his caravan.
20 August 1927
"Specs" White owns a garage in town and is the local baseball team's #1 pitcher--but he's more interested in working on his latest invention, a new and improved gas pump, than pitching on the team.
17 August 1949
In this sequel to The Jolson Story, we pick up the singer's career just as he has returned to the stage after a premature retirement.
31 December 1942
As sixteen year old Ann Winters begins a relationship with an older actor to further her career, lookalike fan Penelope Ryan is recruited by a group of former child stars to perform in a USO show.
27 December 1935
A powerful publisher John Mitchell whose pursuit of sensational headlines at the expense of all else takes a personal toll when his daughter Joan is implicated in a murder.
23 January 1940
A New York attorney defends a young man with a criminal past who has been accused of murdering a police inspector.
04 December 1942
The story takes place at a summer theater in the Berkshire Mountains, where heroine Joan Barry (Carol Bruce) is staging a Broadway-bound musical comedy.
05 September 1949
In her attempts to make a splash on Broadway, a lively would-be-actress lands herself in hot water with the mob.
15 November 1927
A police raid on a night club results in the entire cast of the club's floor show being hauled into court, where they must perform their routines for the judge.
23 September 1943
Mystery writer Barry Craig (Allyn Joslyn) and his wife Jane (Evelyn Keyes), prefer solving crimes rather than writing about them.
18 April 1941
The Cisco Kid is captured while keeping a rendezvous with cantina dancer Dolores but is released by his captor, the commander of a U.
17 February 1944
One of the members of a sorority is found murdered. Although the police are called in to investigate, some of the girls decide to do some sleuthing on their own to unmask the killer.
07 November 1963
A group of strangers come across a man dying after a car crash who proceeds to tell them about the $350,000 he buried in California.
27 May 1927
To satisfy her controlling mother and secure both of their futures, a daughter hesitantly enters a loveless marriage to a wealthy businessman.
08 January 1927
A gang of inept crooks and even more inept lawmen search for a cache of hidden money.
02 June 1934
Val takes the assistance of a society reporter and a journalist to investigate the disappearance of her half-sister Arlene, a wealthy socialite who is involved in criminal activities.
02 December 1950
An orange packer (Mickey Rooney) foils robbers with magic and wins the boss's (William Demarest) daughter (Terry Moore).
08 August 1941
A detective's wedding is postponed when gunshots are heard nearby.
03 June 1938
Two young men try to wrest their father from the clutches of a gold digger but by mistake think the woman is a young nightclub singer with whom they both fall in love.
24 December 1937
West Point cadet Dick Thorpe falls in love with a girl, who turns out to be a princess from an European kingdom.
04 July 1949
A young girl is left with the notoriously cheap Sorrowful Jones as a marker for a bet. When her father doesn't return, he learns that taking care of a child interferes with his free-wheeling lifestyle.
19 October 1939
After the death of a United States Senator, the idealistic Jefferson Smith is appointed as his replacement in Washington.
29 March 1953
A woman raises mink to get the coat she's always wanted.
16 July 1937
J.B. Ball, a rich financier, gets fed up with his free-spending family. He takes his wife's just-bought (very expensive) sable coat and throws it out the window, it lands on poor hard-working girl Mary Smith.
08 February 1964
Lucky Jackson arrives in Las Vegas with his car literally in tow ready for the first Grand Prix — once he has the money for an engine.
22 October 1953
Bob Hope stars as an inept member of the chorus boy in a turn of the century stage show. After being fired, he finds himself starring acting as a decoy when a killer goes after the real star.
17 October 1961
Feature-length Western based on the hit TV show 'Tales of Wells Fargo,' about a Wells Fargo Company troubleshooter who becomes the target of an outlaw he helped send to prison.
27 June 1927
The transition from horses to automobiles at the turn of the century causes problems between a father and son.
29 November 1940
Jo March and her husband Professor Bhaer operate the Plumfield School for poor boys. When Dan, a tough street kid, comes to the school, he wins Jo's heart despite his hard edge, and she defends him when he is falsely accused.
24 June 1937
A millionaire is found murdered in his apartment. Suspicion falls on a variety of suspects, including his fiancée and her parents, the butler, and a professional mentalist known as The Great Gambini.
25 October 1940
An office clerk loves entering contests in the hopes of someday winning a fortune and marrying the girl he loves.
29 August 1947
Dozens of star and character-actor cameos and a message about the Variety Club (a show-business charity) are woven into a framework about two hopeful young ladies who come to Hollywood, exchange identities, and cause comic confusion (with slapstick interludes) throughout the Paramount studio.
24 December 1943
A writer for a radio program needs some fresh ideas to juice up his show. For inspiration, he rents a room with a typical American family and begins to secretly write about their true life antics.
06 October 1927
A young Jewish man is torn between tradition and individuality when his old-fashioned family objects to his career as a jazz singer.
09 December 1948
Smith is an iron-willed railroad detective. When his friend Murray is fired from the railroad and begins helping Rebstock wreck trains, Smith must go after him.
22 February 1935
A managing editor sends a socialite reporter to spy on her boyfriend, mixed up in murder.
05 May 1941
Johnny Campbell isa glib campaign manager for gubenatorial candidate Stogie McPhee. Having impulsively promised Johnny that she'll marry him if McPhee wins, heroine Pepper Wilson begins canvassing the voters on behalf of rival candidate Gildersleeve.
21 March 1942
A wire-walker, on the run from gangsters, masquerades as a soldier at her boyfriend's Army base.
10 December 1934
In this thriller, a young woman marries a dashing young man who, unbeknownst to her, is a jewel thief.
04 December 1953
A Southern belle frees a Rebel officer and his men from a Union captain's Arizona fort.
02 June 1938
Frenzied comedy starring June Lang as a reporter investigating the mysterious disappearances of four men who had all withdrawn large sums of money from the local bank in Stockton, Ohio.
30 November 1941
Successful movie director John L. Sullivan, convinced he won't be able to film his ambitious masterpiece until he has suffered, dons a hobo disguise and sets off on a journey, aiming to "know trouble" first-hand.
14 June 1946
Russell and Lynn are a pair of college students in the 1920s. They get mixed up with kind-hearted bootlegger Donlevy who helps them get their boy friends back.
10 January 1942
Broadway gamblers stumble across a plan by Nazi saboteurs to blow up an American battleship.
31 May 1956
Selfish Chris Teller pressures his older brother, a retired climber, to accompany him on a treacherous Alpine climb to loot the bodies of plane crash victims.
29 March 1940
Broadway producer Nicksie North and press agent Scoop Trimble find an investor for their next show who insists that they cast his ex-girlfriend, Clarice Sheldon, in the lead role and rehearse out of town.
22 March 1945
A gambler and his buddy find a wise-guy jockey for their long-shot horse.
16 August 1940
A Tennessee boy (Bob Burns) returns from the big city, runs for mayor and puts his musical kin on the radio.
30 April 1948
Two female con artists from New York City, fleeing the law with money from their latest scam, hide out in a small town in Maine, near the Canadian border.
18 February 1955
Rome is on the verge of being conquered by Hannibal. While Rome's ruler, Fabius Maximus, plots a defense against Hannibal's armies, Fabius' fiancée, Amytis, is curious about the fearless conqueror.
01 December 1952
Estranged brothers (John Payne, Richard Arlen) find themselves on the same lumberjack crew hired by a feisty widow to clear the timber from her Nevada property.
