Edward Gildea De Corsia (September 29, 1903 – April 11, 1973) was an American radio, film, and television actor, best remembered for his chilling debut in The Lady from Shanghai (1947), as the ex-wrestler murderer Willie Garzah in the film The Naked City (1948), and as a gangster who turned state's evidence in the film The Enforcer (1951).

Early life

Career

Radio

De Corsia was a member of the cast of Blackstone Plantation. He starred in the title role on Mike Hammer and played Sergeant Velie on The Adventures of Ellery Queen. He also voiced roles on Family Theater, The March of Time, Cavalcade of America, Gang Busters, and The Shadow.

Film

He made his film debut in Orson Welles' The Lady from Shanghai (1947) and went on to make a career playing villains and gangsters in 1940s and 1950s films, including The Naked City (1948), The Enforcer (1951), Crime Wave (1954), The Big Combo (1955), The Killing (1956), Baby Face Nelson (1957), Slightly Scarlet (1956), and The Joker is Wild (1957). In his last feature, The Outside Man (1972) with Ann-Margret and Angie Dickinson, his character, the mobster Victor, is killed off early in the film, but he later appears as his embalmed corpse, posed in a chair, holding a cigar.

Television

In the late 1950s and 1960s, he appeared in a number of television series, mostly westerns. He appeared in S2 E15 of "Wanted: Dead or Alive" playing George Winters in "Chain Gang" which aired 12/10/1959. He was featured on three episodes of the CBS courtroom drama series Perry Mason, including the episodes "The Case of the Drifting Dropout" (1964), in which he played murder victim Mort Lynch, and "The Case of the Positive Negative" (1966), in the role of murder victim George Emory. Other notable television series appearances included The Lone Ranger; The Untouchables; The Twilight Zone; Sea Hunt; I Dream of Jeannie; The Outer Limits, and The Monkees

Filmography

Selected television