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Prolific Irish character actor Thomas J. Dugan was born in Dublin on New Year's Day 1889. At a young age, his family moved to Philadelphia, where Dugan attended high school. He had a good tenor voice so, after leaving school, he decided to pursue a career in show business. Before appearing on stage, Dugan performed in minstrel and traveling medicine shows that were popular at the time. He played in musical comedies in New York City and vaudeville theaters such as Earl Carroll's Vanities before eventually becoming a comedian on Broadway.
Dugan began his acting career in 1927 with roles in some obscure silent movies. He was lucky enough to be cast in Lights of New York (1928), the very first feature film with all synchronous dialogue (The Jazz Singer (1927) was the first movie to use audible dialogue, but it still used title cards). His best-known films are Ernst Lubitsch's satirical World War II comedy To Be or Not to Be (1942) and the Gene Kelly/Frank Sinatra/Esther Williams musical Take Me Out to the Ball Game (1949).
Over the years, Dugan appeared in more than 260 films, appearing on silver screens frequently until a road accident in California took his life on March 7, 1955. He was 66 years old at the time of his death.- Actress
One of the brightest stars to shine over the Bengal stage, Niharbala was born in 1999 to Kishori Mohan Sarkar and Nirada. Nihar was lucky in the sense that she was given due recognition by her father and was given his name and did not suffer the indignity of being known only as a daughter of Miss Nirada. However, it was the mother who was in charge of bringing up the child and as such Nihar was brought to the theatre at the age of nine. She quit the stage after some time and was given training in music by Gouri Shankar Mishra. Thereafter she rejoined the stage around 1917 and here she received dancing lessons side by side her stage performances. She performed in different theaters of Calcutta and in 1923 history was created with her role as Niyoti in the play Karnarjun. Her songs like Kalprabaha Chale Dhire, Ami Kakhan Bhangi Kakhan Gari and Pran Heena Putul Samaan were great hits and the songs published as gramophone records. In 1925, Niharbala went to Burma as part of Star Theatre group. Karnarjun and Iraner Rani were the two plays staged in Burma. Rabindranath Tagore witnessed her performance in Chirakumar Sabha and was extremely pleased to note that Nihar sang Tagore songs in proper tune and spirit and he gave five more of his songs for the play to be sung by Niharbala. On the stage she became an automatic choice to play singing roles in plays based on Tagore stories. This also led to her recording Tagore songs for The Gramophone Company. In an illustrious career stretching over three decades, Niharbala acted in Rakhibandhan, Chhinnahaar, Apsara, Sadhabar Ekadashi, Muktir Daak, Joydeb, Chandidas, Prafulla, Bandini, Rupkumari, Bibaha Bibhrat, Mrinalini, KapalKundala and several other plays with great success and in her period had no rival be it in acting or singing or dancing. Niharbala's entry into films was through a short film Chandrasekhar where she had noted dramatist Aparesh Chandra Mukhopadhyay as her co star in 1921. Her other memorable film appearances include Mishar Rani (1924), Kelor Kirti (1928), Debdas (1928), Prahlad (1931), Chand Saudagar (1934), Bidyasundar (1935), Selima (1935) and Abartan (1936). In 1944, while on a tour of South India she happened to visit Pandichery and then onwards became a regular visitor to Shri Aurobinda's Ashram there. In 1950 she decided to move out of the limelight and settled as a resident of the Pondichery Ashram. Here she took part in cultural activities and gave music and dance lessons to young ashramites. At Pondicherry , on the 7th of March 1955, Niharbala suffered a heart attack and left for her heavenly abode. She was survived by a brother and his family.- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Richard Nicolas was born on 3 October 1898 in Görlitz, Germany. He was a writer and director, known for Anna Susanna (1953), Die Jahre vergehen (1945) and Bürgermeister Anna (1950). He died on 7 March 1955 in East Berlin, East Germany.