Lugosi, Bela (redirected from Bela Lugosi)

Lugosi, Bela

 orig. Blasko Béla Ferenc Dezsö

Lugosi as Count Dracula

(credit: Culver Pictures)

(born Oct. 20, 1882, Lugos, Hung.—died Aug. 16, 1956, Los Angeles, Calif., U.S.) Hungarian-born U.S. film actor. He acted with the National Theatre in Budapest (1913–19) and appeared in German films before leaving for the U.S. in 1921. He directed and starred in the play Dracula in New York in 1927; he reprised the role, which was ideally suited for his aristocratic manner and heavy accent, in the movie Dracula (1931). His other horror movies include The Black Cat (1934), Mark of the Vampire (1935), Son of Frankenstein (1939), Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman (1943), and The Body Snatcher (1945). Lugosi declined into poverty and obscurity and eventually took roles in low-budget independent films. He was buried wearing the long, black cape that he had worn in Dracula.

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Lugosi, Bela (b. Bela Ferenc Denzso Blasko) (1882–1956) movie actor; born in Lugos, Hungary. He studied at the Academy of Performing Arts in Budapest and played on the Hungarian stage (from 1901) and in Hungarian movies (sometimes under the name of Arisztid Olt) (from 1917). After making several movies in Germany, he came to the U.S.A. in 1921 and began playing character parts on stage and in films. His biggest success came in a stage play, Dracula (1927), which he repeated in the 1931 movie, but this typecast him as a villain and doomed him to playing in a series of low-budget horror films that finally turned him into a parody of himself. Reduced to promoting himself by such gimmicks as giving interviews while lying in a coffin, and constantly with money or marital problems, he became a drug addict and had himself committed to the California State Hospital in 1955. He returned to make three bad movies, including Plan 9 from Outer Space (1956), and when he died he was buried in his Dracula cape.