The Prisoner of Zenda

Elwood Dager Cromwell , known as John Cromwell, was an American film actor, director and producer. Born in Toledo, Ohio, Cromwell made his New York City stage debut in Marian De Forest's adaptation of Little Women on Broadway. It was a hit and ran for 184 performances. He then directed the play... The Painted Woman , which failed. Next, he acted in and co-directed with Frank Craven the hit show Too Many Cooks , which ran for 223 performances. Cromwell played Charles Lomax in the original Broadway production of George Bernard Shaw's play Major Barbara , about a woman of The Salvation Army, and he played the role as Capt. Kearney in the revival of Shaw's Captain Brassbound's Conversion . Among others, he also had a role in The Racket , which ran for 119 performances. The following year while the Broadway company was playing The Racket in Los Angeles, Cromwell was signed to a Paramount Pictures contract as an actor and student director. He made his motion picture debut playing Walter Babbing in the comedy The Dummy , a talkie starring Ruth Chatterton and Fredric March, with Jack Oakie, and Zasu Pitts.
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Woodbridge Strong "Woody" Van Dyke, Jr. was an American motion picture director. Born in San Diego, California, Van Dyke was a child actor on the vaudeville circuit. His early adult years were unsettled, and he moved from career to career until arriving in Hollywood. His first movie assignment was... as an assistant director on the D. W. Griffith feature motion picture Intolerance . That same year he was cast as Charles Dickens in the now lost 1916 film Oliver Twist. He also was one of the assistant directors on the film. During the silent era he learned his craft and by the advent of the talkies was one of MGM's most reliable directors. He came to be known as "One Take Woody" or "One Take Van Dyke", for the speed with which he would complete his assignments, and although not regarded as one of the screen's most talented directors, MGM regarded him as one of the most versatile, equally at home directing costume dramas, westerns, comedies, crime melodramas and musicals. Many of his films were huge hits and top box office in any given year. He received Academy Award for Best Director nominations for The Thin Man and San Francisco .
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