--- name: "Michael J. Pollard" canonical: "https://film.one/person/michael-j-pollard" roles: ["Actor"] born: "30 May 1939" died: "20 November 2019" reviewed_on_fi1m: 3 average_fi1m_score: 86 average_as: "actor" average_over: 2 updated: "2026-09-20T04:53:31.517117+00:00" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Michael J. Pollard Actor. Born 30 May 1939 in Passaic, New Jersey, USA. Died 20 November 2019. ## Details - **Work:** Actor - **Born:** 30 May 1939, Passaic, New Jersey, USA - **Died:** 20 November 2019 - **Active:** 1966–1967 - **Also known as:** Michael John Pollack Jr., Michael John Pollack, Michael John Pollard, Michael Pollard, مایکل جی. پولارد - **Titles on Fi1m:** 3: 2 acting, 1 other - **Academy Awards:** 1 Oscar nomination - **Average Fi1m score:** 86, as actor, over 2 titles - **Elsewhere:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_J._Pollard, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q730270, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0689488/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/6451 ## Fi1m on Michael J. Pollard > A face built for the back seat of a getaway car: squint, grin, dimpled chin and hardly a word to say. Pollard played one kind of man for fifty years, and in *Bonnie and Clyde* that man is the reason the film hurts. Near the end of the first act of *Bonnie and Clyde* (1967), C. W. Moss is left in the getaway car outside a bank and, because nobody has told him not to, parks it in a space. Michael J. Pollard plays the whole thing with a face that seems to be waiting for someone to explain the joke to him. We laughed at the reversing and the horn. Then Clyde fires through the window, a clerk's face comes apart, and the laugh stuck in our throats, and part of what made it stick was Pollard, still sitting there looking pleased with himself. He is the film's fool, and the film lets him stay one. That face did most of his work for him: the bulbous nose, the dimpled chin, the squint and the smirk, and a way of letting a line arrive late, as if it had travelled some distance to reach him. He had been at it for years before anyone noticed. There was television from 1958, including *Alfred Hitchcock Presents* and *The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis*, and Broadway, where he was the first Hugo Peabody in *Bye Bye Birdie* (1960). In 1966 he turned up in *The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming* and *The Wild Angels*. Then Arthur Penn cast him as C. W., and the persona was fixed. Fixed is the word. For a short while the films let him carry things: *Little Fauss and Big Halsy* (1970), as Little Fauss opposite Robert Redford, and *Dirty Little Billy* (1972), which cast him as Billy the Kid and asked him to play the twitch as a psychopath's. After that he went back to the edges, where a camera could find him and leave. Andy the volunteer firefighter in *Roxanne* (1987), Herman in *Scrooged* (1988), Bug Bailey in *Dick Tracy* (1990), where Warren Beatty, his Clyde, was now directing him, and a late turn as Stucky in Rob Zombie's *House of 1000 Corpses* (2003). We have not reviewed these and will not pretend to have weighed them, but the parts describe themselves: the odd man in the corner, there to be looked at. The criticism is the obvious one, and it is fair: after 1967 he was hardly ever asked to do anything but this. Pollard seems to have known it. Asked in 1969 about his screen persona, he said: "Same thing I've been doing for 10 years, man." There is no complaint in that, and we are not sure there should be. Most actors spend a career looking for one face an audience will remember. He had his before he was thirty, and it does its best work in a film that still holds, cut by Dede Allen, in which a boy parks a car and a man dies for it. Start there. Watch him when he is not speaking, which is most of the time. ## Biography Michael J. Pollard was an American character actor. Born Michael John Pollack Jr. on 30 May 1939 in Passaic, New Jersey, he attended Montclair Academy and studied at the Actors Studio in New York. He made his Broadway debut in 1958 in Comes a Day and appeared in the original productions of A Loss of Roses (1959) and Bye Bye Birdie (1960). Pollard is best known for playing C. W. Moss in Bonnie and Clyde (1967), for which he received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor and a BAFTA Award for Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles. His other film and television credits include Star Trek (1966), Roxanne (1987), Tango & Cash (1989), Dick Tracy (1990) and House of 1000 Corpses (2003). He died on 20 November 2019 in Los Angeles. *Sources: en.wikipedia.org, nytimes.com, imdb.com.* ## On Fi1m (3) ### Performed in (2) — the average rests on these - *Bonnie and Clyde* (1967), Fi1m 88, as C. W. Moss — [page](https://film.one/film/bonnie-and-clyde.md) - *Star Trek* (1966), Fi1m 83, as Jahn — [page](https://film.one/tv/star-trek-1966.md) ### Also credited (1) — thanks, archive footage, uncredited - *The Russians Are Coming! The Russians Are Coming!* (1966), Fi1m 70, as Stanley (uncredited) — [page](https://film.one/film/the-russians-are-coming-the-russians-are-coming.md) ## Complete filmography (94) Every credit, newest first. Titles without a page can be requested for review on the HTML page. - *Sleepaway Camp IV: The Survivor* (2012), as Herman (archive footage) - *House of 1000 Corpses* (2003), as Stucky - *Backflash* (2002), as Don - *Out of the Black* (2001), as Ned - *Forever Lulu* (2000), as Hippie - *Tumbleweeds* (1999), as Mr. Cummings - *Jack & Jill* (1999), series, as Ice Cream Man - *The Debtors* (1999), Actor - *Becker* (1998), series, as Elliott - *The Unknown Cyclist* (1998), as Gabe Sinclair - *L.A. Doctors* (1998), series, as 8294-7 - *Merchants of Venus* (1998), as The Senator - *Stir* (1997), as Hotel Manager - *The Odyssey* (1997), series, as Aeolus - *Toxic Crusaders: The Movie* (1997), Actor - *Mad Dog Time* (1996), as Red Mash - *Skeeter* (1993), as Hopper - *Arizona Dream* (1993), as Fabian - *Split Second* (1992), as The Rat Catcher - *Eerie, Indiana* (1991), series, as Claude - *Motorama* (1991), as Lou - *The Art of Dying* (1991), as Delbert - *Toxic Crusaders* (1991), series, as Psycho (voice) - *The Arrival* (1991), as Lou - *Working Tra$h* (1990), as Palomar - *Shades of L.A.* (1990), series, Actor - *Dick Tracy* (1990), as Bug Bailey - *Enid Is Sleeping* (1990), as Motel Manager - *Wings* (1990), series, as Benny - *Nasty Boys* (1990), series, Actor - *Why Me?* (1990), as Ralph - *Dark Angel* (1990), as Boner - *Tango & Cash* (1989), as Owen - *Heartstopper* (1989), as Dr. Lubbock - *Next of Kin* (1989), as Harold - *Stuck with Each Other* (1989), as Smitty - *The Young Riders* (1989), series, Actor - *Sleepaway Camp III: Teenage Wasteland* (1989), as Herman Miranda - *Tales from the Crypt* (1989), series, as Ed - *Night Visitor* (1989), as Stanley Willard - *Season of Fear* (1989), as Bob - *Fast Food* (1989), as Bud - *Scrooged* (1988), as Herman - *Superboy* (1988), series, Actor - *Paul Reiser: Out on a Whim* (1987), Actor - *The American Way* (1987), as Tesla - *American Gothic* (1987), as Woody - *Roxanne* (1987), as Andy - *America* (1986), as Bob Jolly - *The Patriot* (1986), as Howard - *Leo & Liz in Beverly Hills* (1986), series, as Leonard - *The Ray Bradbury Theater* (1985), series, Actor - *Heated Vengeance* (1985), as Snake - *Candy the Stripper* (1983), Actor - *Simon & Simon* (1981), series, Actor - *The Fall Guy* (1981), series, Actor - *Melvin and Howard* (1980), as Little Red - *Between the Lines* (1977), as The Hawker - *Four of the Apocalypse* (1975), as Clem - *Sunday in the Country* (1974), as Leroy - *Movin' On* (1974), series, Actor - *Dirty Little Billy* (1972), as Billy Bonney - *Morbidness* (1972), as Man of the House - *The Legend of Frenchie King* (1971), as Marshal Jefferds - *Little Fauss and Big Halsy* (1970), as Little Fauss - *Hannibal Brooks* (1969), as Packy - *The Smugglers* (1968), as Piero - *Jigsaw* (1968), as Dill - *Cimarron Strip* (1967), series, Actor - *Bonnie and Clyde* (1967), as C. W. Moss — Fi1m 88, [page](https://film.one/film/bonnie-and-clyde.md) - *Caprice* (1967), as Barney - *Enter Laughing* (1967), as Marvin - *The Girl from U.N.C.L.E.* (1966), series, as Herbie - *Star Trek* (1966), series, as Jahn — Fi1m 83, [page](https://film.one/tv/star-trek-1966.md) - *The Wild Angels* (1966), as Pigmy - *The Russians Are Coming! The Russians Are Coming!* (1966), as Stanley (uncredited) — Fi1m 70, [page](https://film.one/film/the-russians-are-coming-the-russians-are-coming.md) - *Honey West* (1965), series, as Jingles - *Lost in Space* (1965), series, as The Boy - *Branded* (1965), series, Actor - *The Baileys of Balboa* (1964), series, Actor - *Mr. Novak* (1963), series, as Go-Go Reader - *Summer Magic* (1963), as Digby Popham - *The Stripper* (1963), as Jelly - *Going My Way* (1962), series, Actor - *The Lucy Show* (1962), series, as Ted Mooney - *The Virginian* (1962), series, as Georgie Sam Smith - *Hemingway’s Adventures of a Young Man* (1962), as George - *Route 66* (1960), series, Actor - *The Andy Griffith Show* (1960), series, as Virgil (as Michael Pollard) - *Startime* (1959), series, as Doug - *The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis* (1959), series, as Jerome Krebs - *Alfred Hitchcock Presents* (1955), series, as Hansel Eidelpfeiffer, Shoeshine Boy - *Gunsmoke* (1955), series, as Cyrus - *Schlitz Playhouse of Stars* (1951), series, Actor ## Gallery - ![Michael J. Pollard](https://film.one/media/person/467287/gallery-92ff145510da.jpg) Michael J. Pollard — Distributed by Warner Bros.-Seven Arts., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/Michael_J._Pollard_actor_%28cropped%29.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled) - ![Michael J. Pollard](https://film.one/media/person/467287/gallery-aea7b7be4f8e.jpg) Michael J. Pollard — Image via TMDB - ![Michael J. Pollard](https://film.one/media/person/467287/gallery-07b06a598dbd.jpg) Michael J. Pollard — Image via TMDB ## Awards ### Academy Awards — 0 won, 1 nominated - 1968: Best Supporting Actor (nominated), for *Bonnie and Clyde* *From Wikidata, which records wins more completely than nominations.* --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/person/michael-j-pollard