Jack Kruschen makes a concerned neighbour worth watching: gruff enough to avoid sentimentality, warm enough to matter. We value him most in The Apartment, where Billy Wilder gives his familiar fatherly manner something useful to do.
Fi1m perspective
In The Apartment (1960), Jack Kruschen's Dr. Dreyfuss pays attention to other people. We were moved by his concern for his neighbour, which Kruschen plays without fuss. Alongside Jack Lemmon, he gives Billy Wilder's comedy someone whose decency we can believe in without much persuasion. The film's second half takes longer than it needs, but its patience with people is also what lets a supporting performance like this count. It is the clearest example of what we value in Kruschen.
Radio came first, followed by a film debut in Red, Hot and Blue (1949) and steady supporting work through the 1950s. His dialect skill found regular employment in Italian and Jewish fathers and neighbours, roles that let him combine gruffness with warmth. Dr. Dreyfuss in The Apartment was the breakthrough, and it is easy to see why: the neighbour's concern matters to the film, so Kruschen has something to do with that warmth.
In Cape Fear (1962), he plays attorney Dave Grafton, another of the professional men who recur through his work. We recommend J. Lee Thompson's thriller for its persistent menace, though the writing gives its villain too little scrutiny. Robert Mitchum is the decisive presence there, helped by Thompson's handling of light and shadow. The lawyer is one of the smaller parts on which Kruschen's reputation for reliability rests; we would not recommend the film principally for him.
The later television work, including Webster and Full House, kept returning him to paternal and comic parts. There is a limit to how often gruffness followed by warmth can surprise us, and that casting could make him too easy to take for granted. We would not claim that every small appearance demands rediscovery. For his particular skill at making concern credible, start next door to Jack Lemmon in The Apartment.
Biography
Jack Kruschen was a Canadian-American character actor who appeared in films, television and radio over six decades. Born Jacob Joseph Kruschen in Winnipeg, Manitoba, he began working in radio while still at school and made early television appearances in 1939.
He is best known for his role as Dr. Dreyfuss in Billy Wilder's The Apartment (1960), for which he received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Other film credits include The War of the Worlds (1953), Cape Fear (1962) and The Unsinkable Molly Brown (1964). He also appeared on stage, including the original Broadway production of I Can Get It for You Wholesale (1962) and the London staging of Promises, Promises (1969).
Kruschen had numerous television guest roles, among them appearances in Batman (1966), Full House (1987) and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (1990). He died on 2 April 2002.
