Billy Sullivan
actor, assistant_director
- Birth name:
- William Arthur Sullivan
- Born:
- 1891-07-18, Worcester, Massachusetts, USA
- Died:
- 1946-05-23, Great Neck, Long Island, New York, USA
- Professions:
- actor, assistant_director
Biography
Worcester, Massachusetts, greeted Billy Sullivan’s arrival on 18 July 1891, and from that day forward the stage and screen had a ready-made wise guy with a rubber face and a boxer’s bounce. By 1917 he was already turning heads as the street-hardened hero of Over the Hill, a silent melodrama that proved his knack for mixing grit with charm. Two 1926 releases—The Winner and Broadway Billy—cemented the persona: fast-talking, street-smart, always one step ahead of the next con or chorus girl. Between takes he doubled as an assistant director, quietly learning how to pull the strings from the other side of the camera. Off-set he shared his life with Edith, the woman whose last name the papers never quite caught. The final curtain fell on 23 May 1946 in Great Neck, Long Island, but the flicker of Billy’s on-screen swagger still dances across whatever silver can still catch the light.
