Billy Bevan - Australian Comedian and Actor

[Frances]

Not as well remembered as some of his contemporaries perhaps, but not entirely forgotten either.

Billy Bevan was one of Mack Sennett's most popular comedians of the 1920s and continued to make comedy shorts into the early sound era but, as tastes in comedy changed, he moved into playing character parts, mostly as a Cockney (to uneducated American ears an Australian accent sounded pretty much the same) such as the ticket collector in the Basil Rathbone/Nigel Bruce Sherlock Holmes movie, "Terror by Night" and as the bus conductor in "Mrs Miniver".

Born in Orange in New South Wales in 1887, Billy Bevan (William Bevan Harris) is credited with over 260 appearances in Hollywood movies made between about 1916 and 1952. He arrived in America at the age of 25, in 1912. He first appeared in films in 1916, and made a name for himself working for the Mack Sennett studios after 1919.

In the late 1920s, Bevan bought land in Escondido in San Diego County, and established a citrus and avocado farm. He moved there in the early 1930s, only returning to Hollywood to work on films. He was active in the local community, taking a leading role in the Escondido soil conservation district, and the local fish and game association. He died there in 1957.


First, a compilation:



And, second, a complete silent two-reeler, one of many that can be found on Youtube: