Movie Musings: Disney and More

Hans Conried: The “Hookiest” of all Captain Hooks

Hans Conried was an actor born in Baltimore, Maryland on April 15th, 1917. He was raised in both Baltimore and later New York City where he studied acting at Columbia University. He made his film debut at the age of 21 in MGM’s Dramatic School (1938), and enlisted in the United States Army in 1944, though he continued to appear on radio in the 1940s. In the 1950s, he continued to act in radio, and the “Broadway” and “Disney” Chapters of his career began.

In 1953, Hans Conried was cast in the dual voice-over role of Captain Hook and Mr. George Darling in Walt Disney’s Peter Pan (1953). That same year he made his Broadway debut in the musical Can-Can, and also starred in the films Siren of Bagdad, The Twonky, The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T, The Affairs of Dobie Gillis, the short-lived TV series I’ll Buy That, the Columbia Pictures short The Emperor’s New Clothes and the Disney short, Ben & Me.

In 1955, Conried portrayed Thimblerig in Disney’s Davy Crockett: King of the Wild Frontier. He lent his voice to the Magic Mirror for a few episodes of the Disney Television Show, Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color (1954-1991), one of which was the very first show Disney made for television called One Hour in Wonderland, airing on Christmas Day, 1950. In “One Hour in Wonderland,” he was reunited with “Peter Pan,” co-stars Bobby Driscoll and Kathryn Beaumont. Conreid also voiced the prosecutor for a short called The Story of Anyburg, U.S.A., in 1957. He originally was chosen to voice Princess Aurora’s/Sleeping Beauty’s father King Stefan in Sleeping Beauty (1959) and had even recorded some lines before being replaced by Taylor Holmes. In the 1970s, he acted in the live-action films The Shaggy D.A. (1976) (the sequel to The Shaggy Dog (1959)) and The Cat from Outer Space (1978)

Outside of Disney, Conried acted with the legendary Lucille Ball in various episodes of each of her best known sit-coms, I Love Lucy (1951-1957), The Lucy Show (1962-1968), and Here’s Lucy (1968-1974). He came back to Broadway in the 1970s starring in the musicals 70, Girls, 70 and a revival of the musical Irene opposite Debbie Reynolds. He reunited with Columbia to narrate/voice Horton the Elephant in Horton Hears a Who (1970) and succeed Boris Karloff as the Grinch in the special Halloween is Grinch Night (1977). He passed away on January 5th, 1982 in Burbank, California due to an unfortunate heart ailment at 64 years of age. 

Hans Conried was an incredibly versatile and hardworking actor, but he will forever be remembered as the voice of Captain Hook in “Peter Pan.” He brilliantly paved the way for other actors to portray the character since the 1953 original: Academy-Award-Winner Dustin Hoffman portrayed Captain Hook in Steven Spielberg’s Hook (1991), Corey Burton voiced Captain Hook in Disney’s theatrical sequel Return to Neverland (2002), Jason Isaacs from “Harry Potter,” portrayed Captain Hook in Universal’s Peter Pan (2003), Academy-Award-Winner Christopher Walken played the role of Captain Hook in NBC’s Peter Pan Live! (2014), and Colin O’Donoghue has played Captain Hook in ABC’s Once Upon a Time (2011-present).