David Joseph Manners (born Rauff de Ryther Duan Acklom; April 30, 1900 – December 23, 1998) was a Canadian-American actor who played John Harker in Tod Browning's 1931 horror classic Dracula, which starred Bela Lugosi in the title role.

David Joseph Manners (originally Rauff De Ryther Duan Acklom) was born in Canada at 108 Tower Road in Halifax, Nova Scotia on April 30, 1900.

[6] Soon, perhaps in an effort to chart an entirely different course for himself professionally, Manners stopped working as an assistant publisher and returned to Canada to study forestry at the University of Toronto.

[2][4] During his time, before he moved to Hollywood at the beginning of the sound era in films, he obtained additional training under Le Gallienne, even though she had remarked that he was "a very bad actor" after seeing one of his performances.

Manners in this period also appeared on the New York stage with Helen Hayes, with whom he co-starred in Edgar Selwyn and Edmund Goulding's play Dancing Mothers at the Booth Theatre.

[4] After arriving in California, around 1927, Manners was serendipitously "discovered" by the movie director James Whale at a Hollywood party, and within a few years he was a popular leading man, playing opposite such actresses as Katharine Hepburn, Barbara Stanwyck, Gloria Stuart, Myrna Loy, Loretta Young, and Ann Dvorak.

During his brief tenure with Warner Bros., which had loaned him to other studios quite frequently, Manners progressed from being a supporting player to achieving true movie-star status following his role in Crooner in 1932.

One of the final films he made before the end of his Warner Bros.' contract was RKO's A Bill of Divorcement, starring John Barrymore, Katharine Hepburn and Billie Burke.

[7] He did, however, continue to perform regularly on stage for another 17 years, appearing in various productions on tour, in summer stock, and on Broadway, including the ill-fated 1946 play Hidden Horizon.

[8] A year later, according to the 1930 United States census, he and his 23-year-old wife were living together in Los Angeles in a $175-a-month rental property, along with Antonio Dumles, a 22-year-old Filipino who was listed as the couple's servant.

[4] In 1998, 20 years after William Mercer's death, David Manners died at age 98 in the health centre of a retirement community in Santa Barbara, California.