Carlos VillarÃas
Carlos Villalba Arias (* July 7, 1892 in Córdoba, † April 27, 1976 in Los Angeles ) was a Spanish- American film actor.
Life
In the 1930s to 1950s Villarias appeared in over 80 theater productions of all genres. His first film he made in 1930, directed by Richard Harlan, entitled El Valiente. In the credits, he sometimes appears as Carolos Villarias or Carlos Villar.
International reputation gained Villarias by his portrayal of the title role in the rotated 1931 in Hollywood, Spanish version of the Universal classic Dracula, directed by George Melford. The American film industry at that time had a strong market in the Spanish-speaking countries ( especially in Latin America ), but the technique of synchronization was not yet available. Therefore, produced the Universal Pictures parallel to its American version of Dracula ( with Bela Lugosi in the title role ) in the same scenes with the same props a Spanish variant in which Villarias took over the lead role. In professional circles, the quality of this Spanish version is far preferred to the Lugosi original. Lupita Tovar, who played the female lead, recalled in a television interview in the 1990s that Villarias and the film crew during the day the shooting of Lugosi film observed in order to do better in their own rotation during the night.
The international breakthrough remained Villarias but despite his great acting performances in Dracula fails. His film was shown only a relatively small audience while his American colleague Lugosi became world-famous. In addition, this version was for decades considered lost and emerged only in the 1990s again.
Villarias ended his film career in 1956, but remained in his adopted home of America and died twenty years later at the age of 84 years.