Digby Bell
actor
- Birth name:
- Digby Valentine Bell
- Born:
- 1849-11-08, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA
- Died:
- 1917-06-20, New York City, New York, USA
- Professions:
- actor
Biography
A pocket-sized dynamo with a tenor’s twinkle, Digby Bell pirouetted through the Savoy world of Gilbert & Sullivan, leaving audiences laughing in keys they didn’t know existed. On an otherwise ordinary evening in 1892 he strode on as Mr. Pipp—Charles Dana Gibson’s pen-and-ink bachelor come to life—and let fly “The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo,” a number that instantly glued itself to every tongue from Broadway to London. Offstage, the 5-foot-5 firecracker could be spotted chasing little white balls across Long Island fairways or shouting himself hoarse over the New York Giants, cap tilted, score-card fluttering, shoulder-to-shoulder with his partner in mischief and meter, the lanky DeWolf Hopper.
