:24:01
He had choice roles in two
Sherlock Holmes films at Universal:
:24:04
The Pearl of Death, where he played
Giles Conover, the keeper of the Creeper,
:24:08
and The Scarlet Claw, where he played
the frightened Judge Brisson.
:24:12
He also locked wits with Bela Lugosi
in Return of the Vampire at Columbia.
:24:17
Mander had a long and colourful career.
:24:19
Sometimes known or billed as
Lionel Mander or Luther Miles,
:24:23
he had been born in
Wolverhampton, England, in 1888,
:24:26
apparently to a very well-to-do family.
:24:34
That's Shakespearean actor Fritz Leiber
playing composer Franz Liszt,
:24:38
powdered wig, warts and all.
:24:41
Like Claude Rains, Miles Mander
had been gassed during World War I.
:24:45
He had been a New Zealand sheep farmer.
:24:47
He wrote novels, plays, newspaper
articles. He was a film exhibitor.
:24:52
He was a globetrotting playboy
who ran through a $350,000 inheritance
:24:57
racing automobiles and promoting
prizefights. He also was a screenwriter,
:25:01
having written the script
for the 1932 version of The Lodger.
:25:07
When Renee Carson arrived in America,
she discovered quickly
:25:10
that her accented English
was going to stand in her way.
:25:13
She did conquer it, and for the next four
years was a very successful radio actress
:25:18
on the verge of
a major film career at this time.
:25:21
In February 1943,
while Phantom was shooting,
:25:24
she fell in love, and married her husband,
who was in the air corps.
:25:28
Their honeymoon lasted three months.
She followed him from camp to camp.
:25:33
Then in May of 1943
he was shipped overseas.
:25:36
Six months later he was killed
when his plane was shot down.
:25:40
Two weeks late
another tragedy overtook Renee
:25:43
when she broke her back,
putting her in the hospital for a year.
:25:47
After securing a small part
in The Picture of Dorian Gray at MGM,
:25:50
she landed a contract
at 20th Century Fox,
:25:53
who put her in pictures like Shock
and The House on 92nd Street.
:25:57
Her last appearance in a film was in 1946,