ACTOR · BORN 1905 · DIED 2007
Charles Lane
- Born
- 26 January 1905, San Francisco, California, USA
- Died
- 9 July 2007
- Known for
- The Aristocats (1970), It's a Wonderful Life (1946), Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)
22 archived facts 3 topics 1 source Last reviewed Sep 2026
All facts (22)
- #001
Though he is often cited as the perfect fit for Lucille Ball's scatterbrained TV character, he and Lucy were actually good friends. They met while she was a chorus girl and worked together in RKO musicals.
- #002
He was one of the last survivors of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.
- #003
On March 16, 2005, he was honored at the TVLand Awards for his long career and his 100th birthday. Accepting the award, he said in his still-booming voice: "In case anyone's interested, I'm still available!"
- #004
He was one of the founders of the television academy and, in 2005, was honored at the Emmy Awards on the occasion of his 100th birthday as its oldest surviving member.
- #005
He was one of the first actors to join the Screen Actors Guild.
- #006
From 1964 until his death, he lived in his house in Brentwood.
- #007
In a short PBS interview about films, the interviewer asked him whether he had any regrets about his films. He said he never got to ride a horse in any of his shows. He told the interviewer he was an excellent rider and had given riding lessons to some western actors.
- #008
Among his most treasured possessions is a letter from director Frank Capra reading "Well, Charlie, you've been my No. 1 crutch," in which Capra informed him that he would appear in 10 of his films.
- #009
He played the McMann & Tate client 8 times on the television series Bewitched (1964).
- #010
An actor who took the stage in the late 1920s, he was among the founding members of SAG at its first public meeting on October 8, 1933.
- #011
The animators on "The Simpsons" designed the blue-haired lawyer (usually representing Mr. Burns) to look like him.
- #012
He frequently appeared as a guest actor on I Love Lucy (1951) and The Lucy Show (1962), almost always playing a hostile bureaucrat with no patience for Lucy's foolish schemes.
- #013
He was survived by his son Tom, his daughter Alice, and his granddaughter Lucy.
- #014
He is perhaps best remembered as the scheming railroad worker Homer Bedloe on TV's Petticoat Junction (1963).
- #015
He appeared in seven Oscar Best Picture nominees: 42nd Street (1933), Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), In Old Chicago (1938), You Can't Take It with You (1938), Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), It's a Wonderful Life (1946) and The Music Man (1962), and You Can't Take It with You won the Best Picture award.
- #016
January 30, 2005 was named "Charles Lane Day" by the Screen Actors Guild.
- #017
He was the son of Alice (Gerstle) and Nevada-born Jacob Bertha Levison. His family were German Jews, and his grandparents were born in Ichenhausen, Swabia, Bavaria and Kaiserslautern, Rhineland-Palatinate.
- #018
He began his acting career in the 1930s at the Pasadena Playhouse, performing Chekhov, Shakespeare and Noel Coward.
- #019
For the best examples of Lane's acting strength, one can see him as the stage manager (billed as "Charles Levison") in Howard Hawks's Twentieth Century (1934), playing opposite John Barrymore, or as the tax assessor in Frank Capra's You Can't Take It with You (1938), where — coincidentally enough — he struggles against Lionel Barrymore. That way one can learn who is normally better (or worst) off than whom! Years later, Lane would again appear alongside Lionel as Mr. Potter's rent collector in It's a Wonderful Life (1946).
- #020
Despite his stern, hard-hearted manner in most of his film and television roles, friends and acquaintances unanimously described Lane as a warm, funny and kind person.
- #021
He was the father of Tom Lane.
- #022
In 1963, Lane played the airport manager in the classic comedy It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. (In the DVD commentary, historian Michael Schlesinger wryly noted, "You do not have a comedy unless you have Charles Lane in it.").
Sources & editorial notes
Reference databases
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