Robert Drouet
actor, director
- Born:
- 1870-03-27, Clinton, Iowa, USA
- Died:
- 1914-08-17, New York City, New York, USA
- Professions:
- actor, director
Biography
Clinton, Iowa, 27 March 1870: the Mississippi River town coughed up a restless boy who would trade cornfields for klieg lights. By twenty-three, Robert Drouet had already sprinted across the boards of half the stock companies in the Midwest; by forty-three, he had jumped to the brand-new art of flickering shadows, steering both sides of the camera. He swaggered through 1913’s *The Two Fathers* as a man haunted by two lives, then slipped into the satin swagger of *Beverly of Graustark* (1914), dueling for crowns and hearts in a kingdom that never was. Weeks later he was in the California dust again, directing and starring in *The Gambler of the West* (1915), dealing aces and justice from a saloon that existed only in nitrate. Between takes he married Mildred Loring—his leading lady off-screen as often as on—turning love scenes into domestic fact. The marriage lasted just longer than the reels he made; an August heat wave in Manhattan stole him on the 17th of 1914, seven weeks before his last gamble premiered. Forty-four years, three coasts, a handful of myths: Robert Drouet left the stage before the century could forget his name.
