About Percy Kilbride
Percy William Kilbride (July 16, 1888 – December 11, 1964) was an American character actor. He made a career of playing country "hicks," most memorably as Pa Kettle in the Ma and Pa Kettle series of feature films. == Early life == Kilbride was born in San Francisco, California, the son of Elizabeth (née Kelly), a native of Maryland, and Owen Kilbride, a Canadian. == Career == Kilbride began working in the theater in 1900, at the age of 12, as a call boy at San Francisco's Central Theatre. After five years on the San Francisco stage, he played light-comedy roles for stock companies in Boston, Albany, Syracuse, Trenton, and Philadelphia, and eventually left to become an actor on Broadway. He first played an 18th-century French dandy in A Tale of Two Cities. His film debut was as Jakey in White Woman (1933), a Pre-Code film starring Carole Lombard. He left Broadway for good in 1942, when Jack Benny insisted that Kilbride reprise his Broadway role in the film version of George Washington Slept Here. According to Benny, Percy Kilbride was the same character offscreen and on: quiet and friendly but principled, refusing to be paid more or less than what he considered a fair salary. Kilbride followed up the Benny film with a featured role in the Olsen and Johnson comedy Crazy House (1943).
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