Claude Rains - (Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Wagon Train, Rawhide) - "The reason I got into Old Hollywood and started studying theatre and film! He's such a little cutie as well as a smoking hot, velvet voiced morsel of evil - he's that good and can play both so easily!..." text propaganda continued below the cut.
William Hopper - (Perry Mason) - "Why do I love him? The list abounds..." text propaganda continued below the cut.
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Claude Rains:
While he might be more famous for his movie roles(like Casablanca, The Invisible Man, Lawrence of Arabia, Now, Voyager, and Mr. Skeffington to name a few!), he was also a television star in his own right! He had lots of guest spots on various shows but in the tv-realm, he's probably the most well known for his work for "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" and was a frequent collaborator with Hitch himself, having the spotlight for five episodes! My favorite tv performance of his was playing Father Amion in the episode "The Horseplayer", where he plays the kindest priest who gets taken for a ride and it's so heartbreaking to see him in tears where he confesses that it's his fault the church's funds were used for less than better means (but it all works out in the end!). It's such an honest performance and it's a refreshing change from all his evil villians (but we love them anyway!) he'd done in the past. Another favorite performance of mine is his performance as Leonard Eldridge in the episode "The Door Without a Key", a seemingly amnesiac old man who makes a bond with a lost boy in a police station. They're adorable together and I found myself tearing up a little when they both confess how lonely they are in the world.
William Hopper -
William Hopper was a tall guy (6'3"!) but such a gentle sweetheart. He was in acting for the majority of his life (barring serving as a frogman in WWII and working as a car salesman post-war for a few years), but he really stepped into his own with his role as Private Detective Paul Drake in the Perry Mason TV Series from 1957-1966. William Hopper actually didn't really love the Hollywood scene, mostly because he grew up with it since he was a child. His mother was Hedda Hopper and she really wanted him to be an actor and became quite overbearing about it, but he was more of an introverted soul. He first started out in films in his early 20s, but William Hopper always felt like people were giving him jobs because of his mother's influence with her gossip column. HOWEVER, after the war and after William Hopper sold cars for a few years, he came back to acting but he said he was only going to come back if 1) he did it his way/gave himself to it and 2) his mother stayed out of his career so he could make it on his own. Those two things happened, and William Hopper made his own way.
His big major starring role in a television series was, without a doubt, Perry Mason. He was Private Detective Paul Drake. To take on that role, William Hopper personally went out and made friends with Private Detectives to try to bring their experiences to his role. William Hopper also was credited by Alan Alda for showing the acting world how to shine as an actor without demanding the spotlight all the time. Alda said: “William Hopper’s ability to be present in a scene without demanding the spotlight is an art form in itself. He showed us that one can shine without the blinding glare.” Which, I think, really was a big testament to William Hopper playing a private detective--- he was always commanding the series and making the moves and observations that led to finding the guilty person in a criminal case, but he was always doing so in a way that was true to the work of a private detective: hiding and working in plain sight.
Other fun facts about William Hopper that make him so lovable: he LOVED the beach and loved fishing and swimming. When he wasn't filming for Perry Mason (they would film 6 days a week for 1 episode during filming), William Hopper would go to the beach. According to an interview, William Hopper's personal wardrobe was mostly casual clothes: swim trunks, sandals, and sweatshirts. He took all his formal wear to the Perry Mason set and just kept it there to wear when he played Paul Drake. He said if he ever had to go to a formal occasion, he would just go drive to the Perry Mason set and pick out one of his outfits. But the formal wear he had was bold! He wore houndstooth jackets, various checked patterns, and herringbone. If he wasn't at the beach, he loved to go to baseball games. In school, he played sports: swimming, baseball, boxing, and basketball.
he's the guy on the far left - I know his face is hard to see here but I'm going for the Hot Vintage Man bare shoulders vibe:
I spoke before about how William Hopper made a lasting impact as an actor portraying Paul Drake and shining without demanding the spotlight, but he also made a lasting contribution to Paul Drake's character. Paul Drake was a character based on Erle Stanley Gardner's books, which were published between 1933-1973. When William Hopper got the role as Paul Drake in the Perry Mason TV show from 1957-1966, Gardner was still writing the books. When asked about playing Paul Drake, William Hopper said: "If they thought they were getting Paul Drake, they were mistaken. Because what they got was me, nobody else. I play him my way. Now I'm amused to read Gardner's new books. Paul Drake comes out like me."
He made such a lasting impression on Paul’s character on TV that even the author of the books started writing Paul like William Hopper's interpretation!
There's also an anecdote from the wardrobe supervisor on the set of Perry Mason who said William Hopper was a very kind man, a good guy, and a good actor. William Hopper's cast mate, Raymond Burr, once said that "William Hopper was even more precise, more good looking, more fun" in real life than what we, the viewers, got to see him on screen.
To add some more to Raymond Burr's point that William Hopper was "fun", he liked to play practical jokes with his castmates on Perry Mason. In an interview, William Hopper said "You might say there's never a serious moment except on camera." He and all his castmates on the set loved to play jokes with each other to make each other laugh. So he was just a fun guy to be around, apparently!
Also, in the final season of Perry Mason, William Hopper cut a tendon on his foot while filming and he wound up in a cast. They had to rewrite the final episodes so that William Hopper didn't have to do a lot of running around like he usually does. Well, in all those final episodes, you wouldn't even tell that William Hopper was in a cast and having to move around in crutches. And I realize that yeah, they rewrote the scripts to help, but William Hopper doesn't waiver once and doesn't let on about his injury. Plus, according to an interview, the cast attached a little horn to William Hopper's crutches and William Hopper would honk the horn when he was coming to let his cast mates know he was there. Which I just kind of think is sweet.
idk I feel like his hands are pretty beautiful here:
Also, I talked before about William Hopper struggling a bit in finding his own way in acting. It wasn't really until he got into TV shows and with Perry Mason that he felt like he found his place and enjoying acting. Before, William talked about being nervous in front of the camera, but it was working on a LIVE TV show with Claire Trevor when he said, "I was so scared I canceled. I swore I'd never act again as long as I lived. Then I thought, what the heck, they can't shoot me, and walked on the set. Something happened then. It was as if someone had surgically removed the nerves."
And when he talks about his role as Paul Drake, he said, "I'm very fond of him, and as long as Perry Mason is around on television defending various and sundry clients, Paul and I will be very happy to be around helping him."
So he really came into his own as Paul Drake, which I really love about William Hopper. To know he found his way and made something he felt proud of.
Also in terms of William Hopper being physically attractive, I mean, he was so incredible. He once said he was just a guy with premature grey hair and a non throbbing actor, but I personally think he's a heart throb. He had the most loveable smile, broad shoulders, a deep, sultry voice, amazing chest hair (lol), and like.. really absurdly beautiful hands?!? He was also really tall and strong but also by every account he was really gentle and sweet. Larger than life. Sometimes in the Perry Mason shows, William Hopper would swim and he has an incredible swim scene that rivals Mr. Darcy. He's in swim trunks and wins a swim race and comes dripping out of the pool to make anyone swoon. I just love him!
