Frank Silvera

Frank Alvin Silvera (July 24, 1914 – June 11, 1970) was a Jamaican-born American character actor and theatrical director whose Broadway career spanned from 1940 to 1965. Born in Kingston, Jamaica to a mixed-race Jamaican mother, Gertrude Bell, and a Portuguese Jewish father, Alfred Silvera, he emigrated to the United States with his family at age six and was raised in Boston. He attended English High School of Boston, studied at Boston University, and later enrolled at Northeastern Law School before leaving in 1934 when he was cast in Paul Green's production of Roll Sweet Chariot.

Following that first stage role, Silvera joined the New England Repertory Theatre, where he performed in productions of Macbeth, Othello, and The Emperor Jones, and also worked with the Federal Theatre and the New Hampshire Repertory Theatre. He made his Broadway debut in 1940 in a small role in Big White Fog. In 1942 he enlisted in the United States Navy, was assigned to Camp Robert Smalls, and worked alongside Owen Dodson overseeing entertainment, directing and acting in radio programs and appearing in USO shows. Honorably discharged in 1945, he joined the cast of Anna Lucasta and became a member of the Actors Studio.

Silvera's Broadway credits include Semi-Detached, Mademoiselle Colombe, and A Hatful of Rain, in which he portrayed John Pope Sr., the Italian father of the characters played by Ben Gazzara and Anthony Franciosa, opening in November 1955. That same year, in August, he appeared in a Broadway revival of Thornton Wilder's The Skin of Our Teeth. He starred as Monsieur Duval in The Lady of the Camellias, a role that earned him a Tony Award nomination for Best Actor in a Play in 1963.

Silvera made his film debut in 1952 in the western The Cimarron Kid. That same year he was cast as General Huerta in Viva Zapata!, starring Marlon Brando, portraying the role both on screen and in a stage production that opened at the Regent Theatre in New York City on February 28, 1952. His strongly Latin appearance led to his being cast across a wide range of ethnic roles throughout his career. He appeared in two films directed by Stanley Kubrick, Fear and Desire (1953) and Killer's Kiss (1955), and in 1962 played Minarii, a Polynesian man, in Mutiny on the Bounty, again opposite Brando. In 1963 he co-starred with Dean Martin in Toys in the Attic. He teamed with Brando for a third time in the 1966 western The Appaloosa, and appeared as Gaspar, one of the Biblical Magi, in the 1965 epic The Greatest Story Ever Told. His other film credits include The St. Valentine's Day Massacre (1967), the Martin Ritt western Hombre (1967), Che! (1969), and Guns of the Magnificent Seven (1969). His final film, Valdez Is Coming, was released posthumously in 1971.

On television, Silvera made guest appearances across numerous series, including Studio One in Hollywood, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Bat Masterson, Thriller, Riverboat, The Untouchables, Gunsmoke, Perry Mason, and Bonanza. In 1962 he portrayed Dr. Koslenko in the Twilight Zone episode "Person or Persons Unknown," opposite Richard Long. At the time of his death he held a recurring role as Don Sebastian Montoya, a Mexican rancher, in the NBC western series The High Chaparral.

In 1964, Silvera and Vantile Whitfield co-founded the Theatre of Being, a Los Angeles-based theatre dedicated to providing black actors with non-stereotypical roles. Among their first productions was The Amen Corner by James Baldwin, which Silvera and Whitfield financed personally and through donations. It opened on March 4, 1964, grossed $200,000 within the year, and moved to Broadway in April 1965, with Beah Richards receiving critical acclaim for her performance in the lead role.

Silvera married actress Anna Lillian Quarles in 1942, having met her during a stage production of Stevedore. Quarles was the sister of historian and educator Benjamin Arthur Quarles. They had two children, Frank Jr. and Linda, before divorcing in 1963. Silvera died on June 11, 1970, at age 55, after accidentally electrocuting himself while repairing a garbage disposal unit in his kitchen. In 1973, the Frank Silvera Writers' Workshop Foundation, Inc. was established in his honor to support African-American actors and playwrights.