Oscar Actors: Huston, Walter–Background, Career, Awards

Walter Huston Career Summary:

checked Oct 21, 2025

My Oscar Book:

Walter Thomas Huston (5, 1883–April 7, 1950) was a Canadian born actor who won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, directed by his son John Huston.

He is the patriarch of the four generations of the Huston acting family, including his son John, Anjelica Huston, Danny Huston, Allegra Huston, and Jack Huston.

The Huston family has produced three generations of Oscar winners: Walter, his son John, and John’s daughter Anjelica.

Huston was born in Toronto, Ontario, where he attended Winchester Street Public School. He was the son of Elizabeth (née McGibbon) and Robert Moore Huston, a farmer who founded a construction company. He was of Scottish and Irish descent.

He had a brother and two sisters, one of whom was theatrical voice coach Margaret Carrington (1877–1941).

His family moved, before his birth, from Melville, where they were farmers. As a young man, he worked in construction and in his spare time attended the Shaw School of Acting. He made his stage debut in 1902. He went on to tour in In Convict Stripes, a play by Hal Reid, father of Wallace Reid and also appeared with Richard Mansfield in Julius Caesar. He again toured in The Sign of the Cross.

In 1904, he married Rhea Gore (1882–1938) and gave up acting to work as manager of electric power stations in Nevada, Missouri. He maintained these jobs until 1909.

In 1909, his marriage foundering, he appeared with older actress Bayonne Whipple (born Mina Rose, 1865–1937). They were billed as Whipple and Huston and, in 1915, they married. Vaudeville was their livelihood into the 1920s.

Huston began his Broadway career on January 22, 1924, when he performed in the play Mr. Pitt. He then solidified Broadway career in “Desire Under the Elms,” Kongo, The Barker, and Elmer the Great.

Once talkies began in Hollywood, he was cast in both character roles and lead man.

His first major role was portraying the villainous Trampas in The Virginian (1929), a Western starring Gary Cooper and Richard Arlen.

Huston’s other early sound roles include Abraham Lincoln (1930), Rain (1932), and Gabriel Over the White House (1933).

Huston remained busy on stage and screen in the 1930s and 1940s, becoming one of America’s most prominent actors.

He starred as the title character in the 1934 Broadway adaptation of Sinclair Lewis’s novel Dodsworth as well as in the film version released in 1936. For his role as Sam Dodsworth, Huston won the NY Film Critics Award for Best Actor and was Oscar nominated.

He performed “September Song” in the original Broadway production of Knickerbocker Holiday (1938).

Huston’s recording of “September Song” is heard in September Affair (1950).

Huston makes uncredited appearance in the 1941 film noir classic The Maltese Falcon, portraying the ship’s captain who is shot just before delivering the black bird to Sam Spade, played by Bogart. Walter’s son, John Huston, directed the picture. As a practical joke, John had his father enter the scene and die in more than 10 different takes.

Contributions to World War II Allied propaganda films, Huston in uncredited role portrays a military instructor in the short “Safeguarding Military Information” (1942). That film was produced by the AMPAS and distributed by the War Activities Committee of the Motion Pictures Industry.

He, along with Anthony Veiller, is also a narrator in the “Why We Fight series of World War II” documentaries directed by Frank Capra.

Other films of this period in which he appears are The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941) as Mr. Scratch, Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942), and Mission to Moscow (1943). In the latter feature, a pro-Soviet World War II propaganda film, he plays United States Ambassador Joseph E. Davies.

Huston portrays the character Howard in the 1948 adventure The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, directed by son John. Based on B. Traven’s novel, the film depicts three gold prospectors in 1920s post-revolution Mexico.

Walter Huston won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for the film, while John Huston won the Best Director, making them the first father and son to win at the same ceremony.

His last film is The Furies (1950),  a Western costarring Barbara Stanwyck and Wendell Corey, Huston’s final line is “There will never be another one like me.”

On April 7, 1950, 2 days after 67th birthday, Huston died of aortic aneurysm in his hotel in Beverly Hills. He was cremated; ashes buried at Belmont Memorial Park in Fresno, California.

In 1960, a decade after his death, Huston received star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6624 Hollywood Boulevard, for contributions to entertainment industry through extensive, critically acclaimed work in motion pictures.

He was also member of the American Theater Hall of Fame.

Huston’s son John initially became a screenwriter before becoming an Oscar-winning director and acclaimed actor. All of Huston’s grandchildren have become actors, and his great-grandson. Granddaughter Anjelica sang “September Song” on the May 7, 2012 episode of the NBC TV series Smash.

Biography

In 1998, Scarecrow Press published John Weld’s September Song—An Intimate Biography of Walter Huston.

Filmography

1929: 3

Gentlemen of the Press Wickland Snell, Film debut
The Lady Lies Robert Rossiter
The Virginian Trampas

1930s: 27

1930

Behind the Make-Up Joe in Clark & White’s Office Uncredited
Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln
The Bad Man Pancho Lopez
The Virtuous Sin Gen. Gregori Platoff

1931

The Criminal Code Mark Brady
The Star Witness District Attorney Whitlock
The Ruling Voice Jack Bannister
A House Divided Seth Law

1932

The Woman from Monte Carlo Captain Carlaix
The Beast of the City Jim Fitzpatrick
Law and Order Frame “Saint” Johnson
The Wet Parade Pow Tarleton
Night Court Judge Andrew J. Moffett
American Madness, Thomas A. Dickson
Kongo, Flint Rutledge
1932 Rain, Alfred Davidson

1933

Gabriel Over the White House, Hon. Judson Hammond
Hell Below Lieut. Comdr. T.J. Toler USN
Storm at Daybreak Mayor Dushan Radovic
Ann Vickers Judge Barney “Barney” Dolphin
The Prizefighter and the Lady, Professor Edwin J. Bennett

1934

Keep ‘Em Rolling Sgt. Benjamin E. ‘Benny’ Walsh

1935

Trans-Atlantic Tunnel, President of the US

1936

Rhodes of Africa Cecil John Rhodes
Dodsworth, Sam Dodsworth, NY Film Critics Best Actor, Oscar Nom

1938

Of Human Hearts Ethan Wilkins

1939

The Light That Failed, Torpenhow

1940s: 20

1941

The Maltese Falcon, Captain Jacoby, Uncredited
The Devil Daniel Webster (All That Money Can Buy) Best Actor Nom
Swamp Water Thursday Ragan
The Shanghai Gesture Sir Guy Charteris

1942

Always In My Heart MacKenzie “Mac” Scott
In This Our Life Bartender Uncredited

Yankee Doodle Dandy, Jerry Cohan, Supporting Actor nomination

1943

December 7th Uncle Sam
The Outlaw Doc Holliday
Edge of Darkness Dr. Martin Stensgard
Mission to Moscow Ambassador Joseph E. Davies
The North Star Dr. Kurin

1944

Dragon Seed, Ling Tan

1945

And Then There Were None, Dr. Edward G. Armstrong

1946

Dragonwyck, Ephraim Wells
Duel in the Sun, The Sinkiller

1948

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Howard, Best Supporting Actor; NBR Award for Best Actor; NY Film Critics Best Actor (2nd place)

Summer Holiday Mr. Nat Miller

1949

The Great Sinner, General Ostrovsky

1950

The Furies, T.C. Jeffords (final film role)