Donald Woods (born Ralph Lewis Zink; December 2, 1906 – March 5, 1998) was a Canadian-American film and television actor whose career in Hollywood spanned six decades.
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Life and career
Woods was born in Manitoba and was raised in California. His parents were William and Margaret Zink, Presbyterians of German descent. His younger brother, Clarence Russell Zink, also became an actor (Russ Conway).
Woods graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, and began his career in West Coast stock theater.
He made his film debut in 1928. His screen career was spent mostly in B movies, for example as lawyer Perry Mason in the 1937 film The Case of the Stuttering Bishop. He also played romantic leads in B comedies, notably the popular Mexican Spitfire series opposite Lupe Velez.
He also occasionally played major roles in bigger feature films like A Tale of Two Cities (1935), Anthony Adverse (1936), If I Had My Way (1940, as a doomed bridge worker), Watch on the Rhine (1943), The Bridge of San Luis Rey (1944), and Roughly Speaking (1945). In 1945 he co-starred in the Christmas-themed parable Star in the Night, as a hitchhiker who awakens a stone-hearted innkeeper to the true spirit of Christmas. Woods's sensitive performance attracted attention, and the film won the "Best Short Subject" Academy Award.
Of considerable importance to Donald Woods's acting career were several seasons as leading man with the Elitch Gardens Theatre Company in Denver, Colorado, where he performed in 1932, 1933, 1939, 1941, 1947, and 1948.
