Bull Montana
Acting • Born 1887-05-15 – Died 1950-01-24
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Lewis Montagna (born Luigi Montagna, May 16, 1887 – January 24, 1950), better known as Bull Montana, was an Italian-American professional wrestler and actor. Montagna was born on May 16, 1887 in Voghera, Italy and came to the United States as a child. He became a professional wrestler under the name of Bull Montana. He gravitated to films in 1917, appearing first in several of the vehicles of his close pal Douglas Fairbanks. In 1919 he appeared as a gruesome villain in Maurice Tourneur's masterpiece Victory alongside Lon Chaney. Numbered among his many friends was Abe "The Newsboy" Hollandersky, boxer, wrestler, and movie extra, who claimed Montagna offered to help him finance his 1930 autobiography. In the early 1920s Montana, as he was known, often wrestled with his friend Jack Dempsey prior to some of Dempsey's larger fights to help entertain the press and spectators. Montagna was usually cast as a thug, henchman or something not quite sympathetic, and sometimes not quite human (he was the apelike cave dweller in 1925's The Lost World opposite Wallace Beery as Arthur Conan Doyle's Professor Challenger). Tempering his on-screen brutishness with humor, Montana starred in his own series of two-reel comedies in the early 1920s, spoofing everyone from Robin Hood (Rob 'Em Good) to the Corsican Brothers (The Two Twins). He appeared in two Buster Keaton films including a role as a professional wrestler in the film Palooka from Paducah. He continued playing movie bits into the 1940s, notably as one of Buster Crabbe's antagonists in the 1936 series Flash Gordon. Like many mashed-face musclemen of the movies, Bull Montana is reputed to have been as gentle as a lamb in real life.
Filmography
58 credits
The Lost World
Movie • 1925
Ape Man
Gay and Devilish
Movie • 1922
Tony
The Unpardonable Sin
Movie • 1919
The Brute
Treasure Island
Movie • 1920
Morgan
Good Morning, Judge
Movie • 1928
First Crook
Crazy to Marry
Movie • 1921
Dago Red (a crook)
The Timber Queen
Movie • 1922
The Border Legion
Movie • 1918
Red Pierce
Tiger Rose
Movie • 1929
Joe
Many Scrappy Returns
Movie • 1927
Zozo's Husband
The Fight Pest
Movie • 1928
Loud Soup
Movie • 1929
Convict
Palooka from Paducah
Movie • 1935
Bullfrog Kraus
The Skyrocket
Movie • 1926
Film Comedian
Hollywood
Movie • 1923
Bull Montana
The Three Must-Get-Theres
Movie • 1922
Li'l Cardinal Richie-Loo
Never Too Late
Movie • 1935
Monte, an escaped convict
Held to Answer
Movie • 1923
'Red' Lizard
How to Handle Women
Movie • 1928
The Turk
Limousine Love
Movie • 1928
The Chauffer
He Comes Up Smiling
Movie • 1918
Baron Bean
Go and Get It
Movie • 1920
The Gorilla
The Son of the Sheik
Movie • 1926
Mountebank
The Fire Patrol
Movie • 1924
Fireman
Down to Earth
Movie • 1917
Wild Man
The Uneasy Three
Movie • 1925
The Adventures of Daredevil Jack
Movie • 1920
When the Clouds Roll By
Movie • 1919
The Nightmare
Victory
Movie • 1919
Pedro
On the Front Page
Movie • 1926
Private Secretary
Johanna Enlists
Movie • 1918
Brakeman (uncredited)
One Wild Week
Movie • 1921
Red Mike
Painted People
Movie • 1924
Ed Decker
His Majesty, the American
Movie • 1919
Undetermined Role
Hello, 'Frisco
Movie • 1924
Bull Montana
The Sting of Stings
Movie • 1927
Bull Montana
Big City
Movie • 1937
Bull Montana
Hard Luck
Movie • 1921
Virginia's Husband
Brass Buttons
Movie • 1919
Jake the Priest
Dick Turpin
Movie • 1925
Bully Boy
Spaceship to the Unknown
Movie • 1966
Monkey-Man (archive footage) (uncredited)
The Foolish Age
Movie • 1921
Bubbs
Glorifying the American Girl
Movie • 1929
Customer Requesting "Baby Face" (uncredited)
Wild and Woolly
Movie • 1917
Bartender (Uncredited)
No Father to Guide Him
Movie • 1925
Wanted Kidnapper in Photo (uncredited)
Laughing at Danger
Movie • 1924
Killer Murphy
Snap Judgment
Movie • 1917
Bull Montana
Cowardice Court
Movie • 1919
Flash Morton
Vanishing Millions
Movie • 1926
The Gorilla
Fair Enough
Movie • 1918
'Happy' Flanigan
Flash Gordon
Movie • 1936
Monkey Man
What Women Love
Movie • 1920
Jose
Easy to Make Money
Movie • 1919
Charles 'Kid' Miller
Jealous Husbands
Movie • 1923
Portland Kid
In for Thirty Days
Movie • 1919
'Hot Stove' Kelly
In Again, Out Again
Movie • 1917
Quenton Auburn - The Burglar
Hearts Are Trumps
Movie • 1920
Jake
The Bashful Buccaneer
Movie • 1925
Second Mate