Gordon Mitchell
Biography
Date of Birth 29 July 1923, Denver, Colorado, USA Date of Death 20 September 2003, Marina Del Rey, California, USA (natural causes) Birth Name Charles Allen Pendleton Height 6' 3" (1.91 m) Mini Biography Gordon Mitchell was one of those perfectly developed bodybuilders who jumped on the Steve Reeves bandwagon and hightailed it to Italy to seek movie stardom as a Herculean strongman. Born in Denver, Colorado, but raised in Inglewood, California, Mitchell served in WWII and at one point became a prisoner of war. After the war he went to college and became a high school teacher, albeit an imposing one, what with his incredible physique. He eventually became part of the "Muscle Beach" crowd and flexed his way into the entertainment field as part of Mae West's musclebound revues, where he toured everywhere from Las Vegas to the Latin Quarter with other "abs"normal actor wannabes such as Mickey Hargitay, Brad Harris and Reg Lewis. Mitchell took a fancy to show biz and appeared as posing beefcake in such films as The Ten Commandments (1956) and Li'l Abner (1959), which, of course, did little to advance his acting career. In 1961, after Reeves' Le fatiche di Ercole (1958) (US title: "Hercules") proved a phenomenal hit and revived the "muscleman" genre, the non-Italian-speaking Mitchell headed off to Europe and began appearing in the same type of badly dubbed sandal-and-spear epics. Adept at displaying both heroics and villainy, he developed his own core of fans, but when the fad wore off around 1965, Mitchell--unlike many of his colleagues in that field who just dropped out of sight--stayed on and appeared in over 100 more films, many of them in the "spaghetti western" genre, staying true to the country that made him a star. Trivia Served in the U.S. army in the Korean War. Early in his career he toured as one of a group of "strongman" performers--one of whom was Mickey Hargitay--in Mae West's nightclub act. He built amost single-handedly a small western-like village in the Roman countryside, that was used as the set for several Italian B-westerns. Following his success in Italy, he helped his muscular friend Dan Vadis get into the Italian movie business. His funeral memorial service was attended by Arnold Schwarzenegger, Lou Ferrigno, Roland Kickinger, Franco Columbu, Mickey Hargitay, Richard Harrison, Sebastian Harrison, Joe Gold, Scott Brown, Michael A. Martinez, and Robert Amstler in front of the World Gym corporate headquarters. Honored by the UCLA Film Archive at a July 6, 2003, festival showing of The Giant of Metropolis (1961) in a theater on the Los Angeles campus. Where Are They Now (April 2002) Owner of World Gym International in Marina Del Rey, California
The Enemy Below
German Sailor
The Giant of Metropolis
Obro
Frankenstein '80
Dr. Otto Frankenstein
Shanghai Joe
Burying Sam
La vendetta di Lady Morgan
Roger
Blood Delirium
Hermann
Coffin Full of Dollars
John
Three Graves for a Winchester
Frank Sanders
Dead for a Dollar
Roy Fulton
Django and Sartana's Showdown in The West
Black Burt Keller / Burt Kelly
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Man Pursuing Dalton (archive footage) (uncredited)
Pierre Richard: The Quiet One
Self
Eurocrime! The Italian Cop and Gangster Films That Ruled the '70s
Self (archive footage)
Bikini Drive-In
Goliath
Metamorph
Dan Thorn
Blood Delirium
Hermann
Overdose
Costa
SFX Retaliator
Morgan
The Alien Within
Dan Thorn
Cross of the Seven Jewels
Black Mass Leader
Commando Invasion
General MacMoreland
Afrikanter
Rolf
Operation Nam
Col. Mortimer
White Fire
Olaf
She
Hector
Diamond Connection
Harry / Abdul Pasha
Se tutto va bene siamo rovinati
Jack Volpetti
Endgame - Bronx lotta finale
Col. Morgan
Rush
Yor
Vai avanti tu che mi vien da ridere
Il killer
Marco Polo
Arnolfo (1 episode, 1982)
Inchon!
GHQ Officer (uncredited)
La dottoressa preferisce i marinai
The killer
The Umbrella Coup
Moskovitz, le tueur
Holocaust 2: The Memories, Delirium and the Vendetta, Part Two
Felix Oppenheimer
Emmanuelle, Queen of Sados
Robert
Adios Companeros FSK18
John
Dottor Jekyll e gentile signora
Pretorius
Black Gold Dossier
Paul
A Very Special Woman
Gordon
Clubul Salamandrelor
Burt
Wüstenfüchse kennen kein Erbarmen
Kommandant von Stolzen
Special Squad Shoots on Sight
David
Tiger from River Kwai
Jack Mason
The Man from Chicago
Mike
La pelle sotto gli artigli
Professor Helmut
Seven Devils on Horseback
Cooper
Una donna per 7 bastardi
Gordon
Frankenstein's Castle of Freaks
Igor
Shanghai Joe
Burying Sam
Mike
La schiava io ce l'ho e tu no
Von Thirac
Frankenstein '80
Dr. Otto Frankenstein
Stay Away from Trinity... When He Comes to Eldorado
Jonathan Duke
The French Sex Murders
Man in Nightclub (uncredited)
Il magnifico west
Martin
The Big Bust-Out
El Kadir
Slaughter Day
Gordon
Django Always Draws Second
Ray Potter
Savage Guns
Gordon Mitchell (uncredited)
Le saut de l'ange
Henry Di Fusco
Day of Judgment
Deputy Norton
Down with Your Hands... You Scum!
Buck Bradley
Western Story
Ironhead Donovan / Testa di Ferro
Coffin Full of Dollars
John
Finders Killers
Chris Forest
Io Non Spezzo...Rompo
Joe il Rosso
Dead Men Don't Make Shadows
Roger Murdock
Django and Sartana's Showdown in The West
Black Burt Keller / Burt Kelly
Lisa with the Blue Eyes
Football player
I Am Sartana, Your Angel of Death
Deguejo
Fellini Satyricon
Il predone
Hour X Suicide Patrol
Sgt. Orwell Smith
Cry of Death
Donkey / Morgan Pitt
Dead for a Dollar
Roy Fulton
Seven Times Seven
Big Ben
Beyond the Law
Burton
Clayton
Phenomenal
Gregory Falco
John the Bastard
Danite
Reflections in a Golden Eye
Stables Sergeant
Moving Target
The Albanian
Little Rita
Bisonte Seduto / Sitting Bison
Born to Kill
Roose
Für eine handvoll Blei
Baltimore Joe
Schneller als 1000 Colts
Glenn Sheppard
Star Pilot
Murdu
Three Graves for a Winchester
Frank Sanders
La vendetta di Lady Morgan
Roger
Erik the Viking
Sven
Hercules and the Princess of Troy
Pirate Captain
Sinbad Against the 7 Saracens
Omar
A Vingança de Spartacus
Arminio
Balisten
Fury of Achilles
Achilles
Invasion 1700
Ulrich
The Giant of Metropolis
Obro
Der Eroberer von Korinth
Gen. Metellus
Atlas in the Land of the Cyclops
Maciste
Spartacus
Gladiator (uncredited)
L'il Abner (Digitally Remastered)
Muscleman (uncredited)
Rio Bravo
Bar Cowboy Watching Fistfight (uncredited)
Buccaneer, The
Pirate (uncredited)
The Young Lions
(uncredited)
The Enemy Below
German Sailor
The Spirit of St. Louis
(uncredited)
The Ten Commandments
Egyptian Guard (uncredited)
The Man with the Golden Arm
Minor Role (uncredited)
Der steinerne Wald
Hunding
