Frank De Kova
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.
115 acting credits
Acting · 115
Love, American Style
1969
Little House on the Prairie
1974
The Rifleman
1958
Hawaii Five-O
1968
Wagon Train
1957
Maverick
1957
The Rockford Files
1974
The F.B.I.
1965
Cheyenne
1955
Ben Casey
1961
The Incredible Hulk
1977
The Untouchables
1959
Daniel Boone
1964
Lawman
1958
Rawhide
1959
Route 66
1960
Police Woman
1974
Cannon
1971
Thriller
1960
Hawaiian Eye
1959
Baretta
1975
77 Sunset Strip
1958
Gunsmoke
1955
The High Chaparral
1967
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
1955
Peter Gunn
1958
Surfside 6
1960
Kraft Suspense Theatre
1963
The Detectives
1959
The Rebel
1959
Laramie
1959
Black Saddle
1959
Police Story
1973
F Troop
1965
Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse
1958
The Deputy
1959
The Tall Man
1960
It Takes a Thief
1968
Outlaws
1960
The Third Man
1959
The Islanders
1960
The Ten Commandments
1956
The Roaring 20's
1960
The Gallant Men
1962
The Alaskans
1959
The Lawless Years
1959
The Greatest Show on Earth
1963
The Dakotas
1963
Hawkeye and the Last of the Mohicans
1957
The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin
1954
Johnny Staccato
1959
Run, Joe, Run
1974
Toma
1973
The Walter Winchell File
1957
Gunslinger
1961
The Troubleshooters
1959
The Greatest Story Ever Told
1965
The Swiss Family Robinson
1975
The Mechanic
1972
Tales of the 77th Bengal Lancers
1956
The Brothers Karamazov
1958
Cowboy
1958
The Man from Laramie
1955
American Pop
1981
Kiss of Death
1947
Martin Kane, Private Eye
1949
Hey Good Lookin'
1982
Coonskin
1975
Heavy Traffic
1973
Drum Beat
1954
The Rise and Fall of Legs Diamond
1960
Santiago
1956
The Big Sky
1952
Pillars of the Sky
1956
The Jayhawkers!
1959
The Don Is Dead
1973
The Lone Ranger
1956
All the Brothers Were Valiant
1953
Atlantis: The Lost Continent
1961
Arrowhead
1953
Day of the Outlaw
1959
Raiders of the Seven Seas
1953
Run of the Arrow
1957
King of the Khyber Rifles
1953
Follow That Dream
1962
The Desert Song
1953
Strange Lady in Town
1955
Those Calloways
1964
Machine-Gun Kelly
1958
Fighter Attack
1953
Appointment with a Shadow
1957
Ride Out for Revenge
1957
The Wild Country
1970
Teenage Cave Man
1958
The Slams
1973
Johnny Moccasin
1956
Passion
1954
Reprisal!
1956
Valley of the Kings
1954
Split Second
1953
Crossfire
1975
They Rode West
1954
The Sword of Ali Baba
1965
Apache Territory
1958
Shack Out on 101
1955
Johnny Firecloud
1975
The White Squaw
1956
Frasier, the Sensuous Lion
1973
Holiday for Sinners
1952
Not One Shall Die
1957
Hold Back Tomorrow
1955
The Legend of the Boy and the Eagle
1967
Mafia on the Bounty
1980
Baby Needs a New Pair of Shoes
1974
Cat in the Cage
1978