Frank De Kova
Acting
Frank DeKova parlayed a sinister scowl, piercing eyes and an all-around menacing attitude into a long career of playing cold-blooded trigger-men, rampaging Indian chiefs, brutal Mexican army officers and the like. So it would probably come as a shock to those who know his work to discover that, before he became an actor, he was--of all things--a schoolteacher. Born in New York in 1910, DeKova gave up teaching for the stage, and played in many Shakespearean productions before getting work on Broadway. One of his first starring roles was in the classic detective play "Detective Story", which got him noticed and brought to Hollywood. He debuted in Viva Zapata! (1952) as the devious Mexican colonel who sets up Zapata's assassination. For the next several years he played an assortment of gangsters, killers, gunfighters and Indians--with time out to play a prehistoric patriarch in Roger Corman's campy Teenage Cave Man (1958)--and did much television work, including a standout job as a Mafia hit-man assigned to kill Elliot Ness in Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse: The Untouchables: Part 1 (1959). The role for which he will be most remembered, however, is probably the one that was his most atypical: the scheming, somewhat untrustworthy but very funny Hekawi Chief Wild Eagle, the partner to Forrest Tucker's Sgt. O'Rourke in O'Rourke's various schemes to make money, in the western comedy series F Troop (1965). He showed a previously unknown talent for comedy and managed to steal most of the scenes he was in from such veterans as Tucker and Larry Storch. He died in his sleep in 1981.
Hey Good Lookin'
Old Vinnie (voice)
American Pop
Crisco (voice)
Mafia on the Bounty
Rupolo
Cat in the Cage
Rachid Khan
Coonskin
Managan (voice) / Ruby (voice) (uncredited)
Johnny Firecloud
White Eagle
Crossfire
Albert Ambrose
Baby Needs a New Pair of Shoes
Big Tony (as Frank deKova)
The Don Is Dead
Giunta
The Slams
Capiello
Heavy Traffic
Angelo "Angie" Corleone (voice)
Frasier, the Sensuous Lion
The Man
The Mechanic
The Man
The Wild Country
Two Dog
The Legend of the Boy and the Eagle
Narrator (voice)
The Greatest Story Ever Told
The tormentor
The Sword of Ali Baba
Old Baba
Those Calloways
Nigosh
Follow That Dream
Jack (as Frank de Kova)
Atlantis: The Lost Continent
Sonoy the Astrologer
The Rise and Fall of Legs Diamond
Syndicate Chairman
The Jayhawkers!
Evans
Day of the Outlaw
Denver, Bruhn's Gang
Apache Territory
Lugo (as Frank deKova)
Teenage Cave Man
The Black-Bearded One
Machine-Gun Kelly
Harry
The Brothers Karamazov
Capt. Vrublevski
Cowboy
Alcaide
Ride Out for Revenge
Chief Yellow Wolf
Run of the Arrow
Red Cloud (as Frank De Kova)
Appointment with a Shadow
Dutch Hayden
Not One Shall Die
Egyptian Official
Reprisal!
Charlie Washackle
The White Squaw
Yellow Elk
The Ten Commandments
Abiram
Pillars of the Sky
Zachariah
Santiago
Jingo
Johnny Moccasin
Brave Scout
The Lone Ranger
Chief Red Hawk
Shack Out on 101
Prof. Claude Dillon
Hold Back Tomorrow
Priest
The Man from Laramie
Padre
Strange Lady in Town
Anse Hatlo
They Rode West
Isatai
Drum Beat
Modoc Jim
Passion
Martinez (as Frank de Kova)
Valley of the Kings
Akmed Salah (uncredited)
King of the Khyber Rifles
Ali Nur
Fighter Attack
Benedetto
All the Brothers Were Valiant
Stevenson
Arrowhead
Chief Chattez
The Desert Song
Mindar
Raiders of the Seven Seas
Captain Romero
Split Second
Dummy
The Big Sky
Moleface (uncredited)
Holiday for Sinners
The Wiry Man
Kiss of Death
Con Library (uncredited)