Editing Walter Matthau (section)

===Early work===
Matthau was trained in acting at the [[Dramatic Workshop]] of [[The New School]] with German director [[Erwin Piscator]]. He often joked that his best early review came in a play where he posed as a derelict. One reviewer said, "The others just looked like actors in make-up, Walter Matthau really looks like a [[skid row]] bum!" Matthau was a respected [[theatre|stage]] actor for years in such fare as ''[[Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (play)|Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?]]'' and ''[[L'Idiote|A Shot in the Dark]]'', for his performance in the latter winning the [[16th Tony Awards|1962]] [[Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play]].<ref name="ibdb"/>

[[File:Walter Matthau in Charade 2.jpg|thumb|left|Matthau in ''[[Charade (1963 film)|Charade]]'', 1963]]
Matthau appeared in the pilot of ''[[Mister Peepers]]'' (1952) with [[Wally Cox]]. For reasons unknown, he used the name Leonard Elliot. His role was of the gym teacher Mr. Wall. He made his motion picture debut as a whip-wielding bad guy in ''[[The Kentuckian (1955 film)|The Kentuckian]]'' (1955) opposite [[Burt Lancaster]]. He played a villain in ''[[King Creole]]'' (1958), in which he gets beaten up by [[Elvis Presley]]. Around the same time, he made ''[[Ride a Crooked Trail]]'' with [[Audie Murphy]], and ''[[Onionhead]]'' (both 1958) starring [[Andy Griffith]]; the latter a box-office flop. Matthau and Griffith appeared previously in the critical and box-office hit ''[[A Face in the Crowd (film)|A Face in the Crowd]]'' (1957), directed by [[Elia Kazan]]. Matthau appeared with [[James Mason]] in ''[[Bigger Than Life]]'' (1956), directed by [[Nicholas Ray]]. Matthau directed a low-budget film called ''The Gangster Story'' (1960) and played a sympathetic sheriff in ''[[Lonely Are the Brave]]'' (1962), which starred [[Kirk Douglas]]. He appeared in the [[Cary Grant]]-[[Audrey Hepburn]] crime thriller ''[[Charade (1963 film)|Charade]]'' (1963).

On [[television]], he appeared twice on ''[[Naked City (TV series)|Naked City]]'', as well as in four installments of ''[[Alfred Hitchcock Presents]]''. He appeared eight times between 1962 and 1964 on ''[[The DuPont Show of the Week]]'' and as Franklin Gaer in an episode of ''[[Dr. Kildare (TV series)|Dr. Kildare]]'' ("Man Is a Rock", 1964).