Born as Clarence Gordon Prouty in Boston, Massachusetts, Prouty was a vaudeville performer before becoming a film actor.

Mostly appearing in comedies, he occasionally performed a serious character role, for instance a small part as an oily publicist in A Star is Born (1937).

After a significant career in silent films, a large part of Prouty's later career was the Jones Family film series.

[1] They were 17 low-budget 20th Century Fox family comedies between 1936 and 1940, along with Spring Byington as Mrs. Jones, for such directors as Malcolm St. Clair and Frank R. Strayer.

This article about a United States film actor born in the 1870s is a stub.