BIO

Jack Haley was born John Joseph Haley in 1898, in Boston, Massachusetts.

Haley started out in vaudeville as a song-and-dance comedian.  He made his Broadway debut in 1924, at the age of 26, and appeared in 10 productions through 1949, including starring roles in Gay Paree (1926-1927) and Inside U.S.A. (1948-1949).

Haley made his film debut in 1927, at the age of 29, for Excellent Pictures.   Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer hired Haley for The Wizard of Oz (1939) after another song-and-dance comic, Buddy Ebsen, had a near-fatal reaction from inhaling the aluminum dust makeup for the Tin Man character.   The makeup was switched to a paste to avoid the same reaction by Haley, although a resulting eye infection caused him to miss four days of filming.

Haley returned to musical comedies in the 1940s and then performed as a television guest star beginning in the 1950s.   After more than 35 motion pictures, his last film was released in 1977.

He married Florence McFadden in 1921.   Flo Haley, as she was known, opened a successful beauty shop and catered to many entertainers.   The couple raised one son, Jack Haley, Jr. (later a successful film producer) and one daughter.   Jack Jr. was the second husband of Liza Minnelli, daughter of his father's Wizard of Oz co-star Judy Garland, between 1974 and 1979.

Haley died of a heart attack in 1979 in Los Angeles at the age of 80.

Additional Broadway stage history is available at:

Additional biographical information is available at:

NOTED FILMS

Complete filmography at: