[citation needed] He returned exclusively to the stage in 1917, where he remained until the advent of sound films.

[1] He returned to the screen with a featured role in the 1930 melodrama, Swing High, starring Helen Twelvetrees.

[2] His more notable performances and roles include: the first talking version of the film Kismet (1930), starring Otis Skinner and Loretta Young;[3] a featured role in 1934's Little Miss Marker, starring Shirley Temple and Adolphe Menjou;[4] Michael Curtiz's Kid Galahad (1937), starring Edward G. Robinson, Bette Davis, and Humphrey Bogart;[5] the Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn romantic comedy Woman of the Year (1942);[6] the classic biopic The Pride of the Yankees (1943), starring Gary Cooper and Teresa Wright;[7] another 1943 biographical film, Yankee Doodle Dandy, starring James Cagney;[8] the Abbott and Costello comedy Buck Privates Come Home (1947);[9] and the last film to be released in which he appeared was 1952's Somebody Loves Me, starring Betty Hutton and Ralph Meeker, which was released several months after Sheehan's death.

Production on Pat and Mike was in early 1952, and it was released in June of that year, four months after Sheehan died.

He died on February 15, 1952, in Woodland Hills, California, and was buried in Holy Cross Cemetery, in Culver City.