Paul Muni (born Frederich Meshilem Meier Weisenfreund; September 22, 1895[1] – August 25, 1967) was an American stage and film actor from Chicago.

He started his acting career in the Yiddish theater and during the 1930s, he was considered one of the most prestigious actors at the Warner Bros. studio and was given the rare privilege of choosing his own parts.

He was also highly skilled in makeup techniques, a talent that he had learned from his parents, who were also actors, and from his early years on stage with the Yiddish theater in Chicago.

Muni was born in 1895 as Frederich Meier Weisenfreund to a Jewish family in Lemberg, Galicia, then Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Lviv, Ukraine).

[4] Film historian Robert Osborne notes that Muni's makeup skills were so creative that for most of his roles, "he transformed his appearance so completely, he was dubbed 'the new Lon Chaney.'"

His first role was that of an elderly Jewish man in the play We Americans, written by playwrights Max Siegel and Milton Herbert Gropper.

His acclaim as a result of his performance impressed Warner Bros., which signed him to a long-term contract, publicizing him as "the screen's greatest actor.

Scarface, part of a cycle of gangster films at the time,[8] was written by Ben Hecht[9]: 6  and directed by Howard Hawks.

Critic Richard Corliss noted in 1974 that while it was a serious gangster film, it also "manages both to congratulate journalism for its importance and to chastise it for its chicanery, by underlining the newspapers' complicity in promoting the underworld image.

Muni persuaded Warner Bros. to take a financial risk by producing the successful historical biography The Story of Louis Pasteur, which was released in 1936.

The film was a recreation of a revolutionary period in China and included special effects for a locust attack and the overthrow of the government.

Because Muni was not of Asian descent, when producer Irving Thalberg offered him the role, he said, "I'm about as Chinese as [President] Herbert Hoover.

In 1946, he appeared on Broadway in A Flag is Born, written by Ben Hecht, to help promote the creation of a Jewish state in Israel.

At London's Phoenix Theatre on July 28, 1949, Muni began a run as Willy Loman in the first British production of Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller.

In 1952, Muni traveled to Italy to star in Stranger on the Prowl directed by Joseph Losey, partly as an act of solidarity and support for blacklisted friends living abroad in exile.

A few years later, during 1955 and 1956, Muni had his biggest stage success in the United States as the crusading lawyer, Henry Drummond (based on Clarence Darrow), in Inherit the Wind, winning a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Play.

In late August 1955, Muni was forced to withdraw from the play due to a serious eye ailment causing deterioration in his eyesight.

"[15] Film historian David Shipman described Muni as "an actor of great integrity",[16] noting he meticulously prepared for his roles.

Muni was widely recognized as eccentric if talented: he objected to anyone wearing red in his presence, and he could often be found between sessions playing his violin.

[16] Muni was "inflexible on matters of taste and principle", once turning down an $800,000 movie contract because he was not happy with the studio's choice of film roles.

"[23] Muni and George Raft appeared as characters in the fifth season of Boardwalk Empire, meeting with Al Capone to discuss the film Scarface.