Biography
Harold J. Stone (March 13, 1913 – November 18, 2005) was an American film and television character actor.
His film debut came in the Alan Ladd film noir classic The Blue Dahlia (1946). He went on to work in small but memorable roles in such "A" films as The Harder They Fall (1956; starring Humphrey Bogart) and Alfred Hitchcock's The Wrong Man (1956). He also appeared in House of Numbers, The Garment Jungle and over 150 television episodes.
Born Harold Hochstein, to a Jewish acting family, he began his career on Broadway in 1939 and appeared in five plays in the next six years, following which he made his motion picture debut. Although he would go on to perform secondary roles in a number of films, he became a recognizable face to television viewers for his more than 150 guest appearances on numerous shows from the 1950s through to the early 1980s. In 1964 he was nominated for an Emmy Award for the "Outstanding Single Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role" for his role in The Nurses.
In the 1970s, while continuing to work in television, Stone returned to the stage, directing several plays that made it to Broadway.
One of his notable roles was as Paul Newman's abusive father in Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956). He was also prominent in Spartacus (1960).
