JOE SAWYER
Date of Birth
29 August 1906,
Guelph, Ontario, Canada
Date of Death
21 April 1982,
Ashland, Oregon, USA (liver cancer)
Birth Name
Joseph Sauers
Spouse
Jeane Wood (? - ?) (divorced)
June (? - 1960) (her death)
Trivia
Former brother-in-law of actress K.T. Stevens and Hugh Marlowe.
Former son-in-law of director Sam Wood.
Although he looked Irish, often played Irish characters and had an "Irish" stage name, his real name was Joseph Sauers and his ancestry was German.
Mini Biography
Joe Sawyer's familiar mug appeared everywhere during the 1930s and 1940s, particularly as a stock player for Warner Bros. in its more standard college musicals, comedies and crime yarns. He could play both sides of the fence, street cops and mob gunmen, with equal ease. He was born Joseph Sauers in Guelph, Canada, on August 29, 1906, and eventually moved to California to pursue a film career. Trained at the Pasadena Playhouse, he had a perfect "tough guy" look: sturdy build, jutting chin and beady eyes, made more distinctive by his shock of light hair and a slightly high-pitched voice. Sawyer made his film debut in 1931 under his real name, which, contrary to popular opinion, was German and not Irish, though he made a career out of playing Irishmen, and appeared mostly in strongarm bit parts in his early career until hitting his stride playing a variety of coaches, cops and sidekicks with imposing names like "Spud," "Slug" and "Whitey." He appeared in hundreds of films, in just about every genre, over a four-decade-long career, among them College Humor (1933), College Rhythm (1934), The Westerner (1934), The Informer (1935), in which his portrayal of an IRA gunman got him noticed by the public and critics alike, Pride of the Marines (1936), Black Legion (1937), The Petrified Forest (1936) (another "tough-guy" role that got him good reviews), The Grapes of Wrath (1940), They Died with Their Boots On (1941), Sergeant York (1941), Tarzan's Desert Mystery (1943), Gilda (1946), It Came from Outer Space (1953), North to Alaska (1960) and How the West Was Won (1962). He also guest-starred on many TV series and was a regular on "The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin" (1954) as Sgt. Aloysius "Biff" O'Hara. His first wife was actress Jeane Wood, the daughter of Gone with the Wind (1939) uncredited director Sam Wood. His second wife, June, died in 1960. Sawyer died in Ashland, Oregon, on April 21, 1982 of liver cancer at the age of 75.
IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Brumburgh
Joe Sawyer was a Canadian film actor. He appeared in more than 200 films between 1930 and 1962.
Popular roles that he portrayed included Sergeant Biff O'Hara
in several Rin Tin Tin television programs, a film, and on radio.
On Stories of the Century in 1954, he portrayed Butch Cassidy
a role which he repeated in the 1958 episode "The Outlaw Legion"
of the syndicated western series, Frontier Doctor, starring
Rex Allen, with Doris Singleton and Michael Ansara as fellow guest stars.
He appeared in They Died with Their Boots On (1941), Tarzan's Desert Mystery (1943),
Gilda (1946), It Came from Outer Space (1953),
Sawyer also appeared on ABC's, Maverick, Sugarfoot,
Peter Gunn, and Surfside 6 as well as NBC's Bat Masterson.
Joe was another member of the
John Ford Stock Company
and made 5 movies with him including
The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
The Informer (1935)
Joe appeared in 5 movies starring or including Duke
How the West Was Won (1962)...Riverboat Officer (uncredited)
North to Alaska (1960)...Land Commissioner
The Long Voyage Home (1940)...Davis (as Joseph Sawyer)
Dark Command (1940)...Bushropp (as Joseph Sawyer)
Maker of Men (1931)...Bennett the Monroe Coach (uncredited)
