Howard Kyle (April 22, 1861 – December 1, 1950) was an American stage and screen actor and lecturer active for over 50 years. He was a founding member and one-time recording-secretary of
. Kyle was perhaps best remembered for his starring roles in the turn of the century plays Way Down East, Nathan Hale and John Ermine of the Yellowstone.
Early life
Born Howard Anderson Vandergrift at
Mt. Carroll, Illinois where his father may have been a proprietor of H. & C. Vandergrift, a general merchandising store. Kyle attended the Mt. Carroll Union School, where he studied Latin and philosophy and was named valedictorian of the 1879 graduating class. At home Kyle received private instructions in French and literature and after high school studied law for two years. By his early teens Kyle had won an oration competition and acquired a keen interest in the works of William Shakespeare. He began his acting career in amateur theatre as Kyle Vandergrift and made his professional stage debut at the age of 23 under the name Howard Kyle.[1][2][3]
Career
Kyle's debuted as
Guildenstern and the Second Grave Digger in Shakespeare's Hamlet at the Meyer's Opera House in Janesville, Wisconsin, on September 10, 1884. He spent the following twelve seasons in tours with a number of large classical repertory companies and made his first appearance in New York in 1887 at the Windsor Theatre as Lucius in the James Sheridan Knowles play Virginius. During the mid-1890s Kyle played leading man roles with stock companies in Salt Lake City, Pittsburg and San Francisco. In late 1897 Kyle began a two-year run at the Manhattan Theatre and national tour of the Grismer and Parker pastoral play Way Down East, playing David Bartlett to Phoebe Davies' Anna Moore. During the season of 1900/01 he played the title role in a successful tour of the Clyde Fitch romantic drama Nathan Hale, with co-star Nanette Comstock as Alice Adams. Kyle was Sir Jasper Thorndyke, the lead character in a 1904 tour of Louis Parker's four-act comedy, Rosemary, and the next year played the title role in a tour of Louis Shipman's adaptation of the Frederic Remington western, John Ermine of the Yellowstone. Kyle later toured with Rose Coghlan's company playing Henry Beauclerc to Coghlan's Countess Zicka in the Victorien Sardou play Diplomacy.[1][2][4]
Though Kyle would return to the stage many times over the following two decades, his last major Broadway role was probably
Century Theatre for 121 performances. Over his career Kyle often appeared on the lecture circuit giving talks on subjects relating to the theatre. He performed in a handful of silent films between 1912 and 1918, such as Don’t Pinch My Pup (1912) with Riley Chamberlin; A Star Reborn (1912) with Florence La Badie; National Red Cross Pageant (1917) with Ethel Barrymore; The Purple Lily (1918) with Frank Mayo and Kitty Gordon; and Wild Honey (1918) with Frank Mills and Doris Kenyon.[1][2][4][5]
Kyle married actress Amy Urcilla Hodges, a sister-in-law of the writer Louis Joseph Vance, at Fort Lee, New Jersey on June 28, 1915. They had met at the Playhouse Theatre the previous year during a production of the Harvey O'Higgins and Harriet Ford story, Polygamy, in which Kyle played the Profit to Hodges’ Charlotte Marini.[8]
Death
Kyle died aged 89, at a New York City nursing home on December 1, 1950. He was survived by his wife.[2]