- Born
- Died
- Birth nameIsadore Louis Bernard van Dommelem
- Born in the Netherlands of Greek/Dutch descent, Lou Tellegen (born Isidor Van Dameler) was a marvelously handsome man whose life was temptestuous. Having something of a wandering pair of feet, he journeyed through Europe during his youth, doing odd jobs like prize fighting, driving a cab in Brussels, and joining a Berlin circus as a trapeze artist. He once spent a month in a Russian prison after being caught selling birth-control pamphlets.
After roaming about in the Brazilian jungles and working as a stoker on a French freighter, Tellegen got into a scrape involving a lady that landed him once more in prison - this time in Paris. He sent a telegram to his friend, actor Édouard de Max, who obtained his release from prison and introduced him to Sarah Bernhardt. She hired him as her leading man and he accompanied her on tour. Tellegen starred as Lord Essex opposite Bernhardt in 1912's La reine Élisabeth (1912). He went on to enjoy a brief career as a matinee hero in silent films and married opera star Geraldine Farrar. They divorced in 1919, and he penned his autobiography "Women Have Been Kind" in 1931, the title of which 'Vanity Fair' later suggested should have been "Women Have Been Kind of Dumb". Ill and debt-ridden, Lou Tellegen committed suicide in 1934 at the Cudahy mansion near Hollywood & Vine by stabbing himself with a pair of scissors.- IMDb mini biography by: Nichol
- SpousesEve Casanova(1930 - 1932)Nina Romano(December 17, 1923 - 1928) (divorced)Geraldine Farrar(February 8, 1916 - 1923) (divorced)Countess de Broncken(1903 - 1905) (divorced)
- Silent-screen actor, formerly leading man and paramour to a considerably Sarah Bernhardt.
- The illegitimate son of a Spanish dancer and general in the army of Queen Wilhemina.
- Tellegen suffered severe burns when he fell asleep with a lighted cigarette in his Atlantic City hotel on Christmas Day, 1929. He underwent extensive plastic surgery in 1931.
- Author of autobiography, Women Have Been Kind," was published in 1932.
- The day after Tellegen's suicide, actress Florence Turner told newspapers that for the past 14 years, she had been having an affair with Tellegen.
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