Horace Allen Morgan (1892-1956) was a studio electrician who became an actor when director Romaine Fielding decided he needed a “fat boy” for a character part in Teasing a Tornado (1915). He went on to be a regular supporting player in silent comedies, working with Buster Keaton on Three Ages (1923) and Sherlock Jr (1924). He played similar roles to Oliver Hardy in his pre-Laurel days.
Morgan was in two Metro musicals. He was in The Rogue Song, and then actually appeared with Oliver Hardy in the uncredited role of Old King Cole in Babes in Toyland.
Wallace Archibald MacDonald (1891-1978) was a Canadian actor who pursued a successful career in Hollywood from 1912. The quality of his roles deteriorated after the introduction of sound, so he moved into producing in 1937. The films he made were ‘B’ pictures, but one of them was the excellent My Name is Julia Ross (1945), directed by Joseph H Lewis.
MacDonald the actor cropped up in two MGM musicals. He was Hassan in The Rogue Song and first mate of the zeppelin in Madam Satan.
Florence Silverlake (1904-80) had a long career that took her from playing Edgar Kennedy’s long-suffering wife in a series of comedy shorts in the early thirties to a part in The Day of the Locust (1975), which was set in the early thirties.
One of Lake’s earliest roles was as the tragic Nadja in The Rogue Song.
Florence Lake was the older sister of Arthur Lake, Blondie’s very own Dagwood.
Elsa Alsen (1880-1975) was a German opera star who relocated permanently to the United States in 1928. She was a soprano, and best-known for her performances in Wagner.
During a trip to Hollywood, where she sang at the Hollywood Bowl, Alsen played Lawrence Tibbett’s mother in The Rogue Song. Ironically, she does not appear to have sung a note in the film.
Ullrich Haupt (1887-1931) was a German actor who relocated to America and made his fil debut in 1916. He worked steadily in supporting roles, and made a successful transition to sound. Haupt was fourth-billed in Josef Von Sternberg’s Morocco (1930), but his career was cut tragically short when he was killed in an accidental shooting on a hunting trip.
Haupt appeared in one MGM musical, as the wicked Prince Serge in The Rogue Song.
Judith Voselli (1895-1966) was born in Barcelona, but was playing supporting roles on Broadway throughout the early 1920s, including several musical comedies.
Vosselli made her first film in 1926, and worked regularly until 1935. Three of her films were MGM musicals. One of these, The Rogue Song, gave her one of her best roles, as the scene-stealing Tatiana. She also made appearances in A Lady’s Morals and Naughty Marietta.
Gertrude Lamson (1874-1965) was a stage actress with an international reputation who specialized in tragic roles, including Hedda Gabler and Camille.
O’Neil began her film career in 1913, playing Mercedes in a version of The Count of Monte Cristo co-directed by Edwin S Porter. With her stage background, she made an easy transition to sound films, and was fourth-billed in Academy Award-winning Cimarron (1931).
She also featured in three Metro musicals, playing Princess Alexandra in the lost The Rogue Song, wealthy Mrs Vibart (the hero’s mother) in The Florodora Girl and the Mother Superior in Call of the Flesh.
Nance O’Neil attracted press attention in the 1900s when she formed an intimate friendship with Lizzie Borden. That salacious interest is maintained on the internet today.
Catherine Dale Owen (1900-1965) was an American blue blood who trained at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. She acted on Broadway from the mid-twenties and made her film debut in His Glorious Night (1929), the film blamed by some commentators for initiating the decline in the career of John Gilbert.
His Glorious Night was directed by actor Lionel Barrymore, who was also at the helm of Owen’s only MGM musical, The Rogue Song. Most of her performance is now lost, though it can be heard on the surviving full audio track.
Lawrence Mervil Tibbet [sic] (1896-1960) was one of the great American opera stars, and also one of the most glamorous. He combined a deep baritone voice, of the quality required by a leading singer at New York’s Metropolitan Opera, with good looks and acting ability. These attributes made it inevitable that, with the advent of sound, Hollywood would come calling. Tibbett had already performed many of the great operatic roles, and developed a successful radio and recording career, when he signed a contract with MGM in 1930.
Tibbett’s career in films did not last long. He starred in four Metro musicals, made a couple of pictures for Fox, and then returned full-time to the stage. But his Hollywood career was by no means a failure. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for his debut performance in The Rogue Song, something achieved by few actors. Unfortunately, The Rogue Song, MGM’s first all-Technicolor musical, is now a lost film.
Following this success, Tibbett did not embarrass himself in his other assignments, New Moon, The Prodigal and The Cuban Love Song (in which he duetted with himself).
By the end of his career, Tibbett had been a leading man at the Met for 27 seasons and established himself in the operatic pantheon.
