Joe Mantell (1915-2010), Film and Television Actor Best Known for his Portrayal of Angie in "Marty" (1955)

[DonRocks]

I find it incredibly rewarding to see an actor I know from Hollywood on a television program - sometimes an obscure actor that today's generation doesn't know about. I look at it as an opportunity to share my knowledge so that life plays out its complex role as a continuum, just as it should do.

Joe Mantell (originally born without that second "l" in Brooklyn, due to his immigrant-Austrian parents), is one such actor.

Mantell received an Academy Award nomination for the 1955 Best Picture, "Marty," for his portrayal of Angie, Marty's best friend. He's also responsible for the famous last line, "Forget it, Jake, it's Chinatown," and had a role in "The Birds."

But Mantell lived to be 95 years old, and had a long and prolific career (although he was sort of typecast into one kind of character). The best article, by far, I've seen on Mantell is here:

http://deadeyedelirium.blogspot.com/2010/10/joe-mantel-1915-2010.html (which I will fix as soon as I get a real computer)

I've since seen Mantell in *five* episodes of shows that I've power-watched:

All In The Family: "Archie The Babysitter"

Alfred Hitchcock Presents: "Guilty Witness"

Alfred Hitchcock Presents: "The Indestructible Mr. Weems"

The Twilight Zone: "Nervous Man in a Four-Dollar Room"

The Twilight Zone: "Steel"

Who was to know that Mantell would live *fifty* more years after his terrific performance in "Nervous Man in a Four-Dollar Room?"

As the terrific blog post above says, Mantell was great in Marty, but he's also been great in everything else I've seen him in, and I've only seen probably 5% of his output.

[DonRocks]

[sorry, folks, I slept on my laptop last night, and woke up with its screen looking like one of Grace Slick's worst-ever acid trips. I have a new machine arriving Thursday - in the meantime, I've been using a combination of my iPhone and this awful desktop which I never did learn how to use. Things will be corrected, I promise - just give me a couple more days. The important thing, to me, is to just keep the content rolling along.

As for the cracked laptop, don't pine for me - Samsung HD Chromebooks, with good speakers, are under $200 now - the way I was going through Apple MacBooks, I can break five Chromebooks for every one MacBook, and have it cost the exact same. Anyone who's hard on their computers, and who feels like they spend too much on MacBooks, write me, and I will guide you (or start a post in the Science forum, and I'll chime in). Chromebooks have changed laptops from a "luxury item" into an "if it breaks, such is life" object - it does *everything* I need it to do, and most importantly, it *forces* me to save my files in the Cloud since there's no hard disk (which takes very little time, and results in ZERO lost pictures, documents, etc., since it's all backed up for you.). Ironically, I have an iPhone 6+, and am completely happy with it - my strategy is now super-duper (*well-protected*) cell phone (with a great camera, and a very good speaker), and throwaway laptops (also with good speakers, and HD) costing under $200.