Tully Marshall

Tully Marshall, born William Phillips on April 10, 1864, in Nevada City, California, was an American character actor whose career encompassed nearly six decades of work across stage and screen. He died on March 10, 1943, at his home in Encino, California, following a heart attack, at the age of 78, and is buried at Hollywood Forever Cemetery.

Marshall received his education at private schools and at Santa Clara College, where he earned an engineering degree. He turned to acting at the age of 18, making his stage debut in Saratoga at the Winter Garden in San Francisco on March 8, 1883. His Broadway career began in 1887, and he continued performing on the New York stage through 1915. During those years he accumulated credits including Paid in Full, The City, Sheridan, Change Alley, Because She Loved Him So, and The Clever Ones, which opened in 1914. Between his stage engagements, Marshall worked extensively with stock theater troupes, serving both as an actor and as stage manager for E. H. Sothern's company.

By the time Marshall arrived in Hollywood in 1914, he carried nearly a quarter century of theatrical experience. His screen debut came in Paid in Full that same year. D. W. Griffith subsequently cast him as the High Priest of Bel in Intolerance in 1916, by which point he had already appeared in multiple silent films. His screen career extended into the sound era, during which he took on a broad range of character types, including drunken trail scouts, unforgiving fathers, sinister attorneys, and lecherous aristocrats. He appeared as John Wayne's sidekick in the widescreen Western The Big Trail, directed by Raoul Walsh in 1930, and in one of his final films, This Gun for Hire in 1942 starring Alan Ladd, he portrayed a sinister nitrogen industrialist.

Marshall was married to screenwriter, playwright, actress, and studio head Marion Fairfax from 1899 until his death in 1943. Fairfax survived him by many years, dying in 1970 at the age of 94.