Joseph Louis DeGrasse, a Hollywood film director and actor, was born to a French Canadian family in 1873. He was the son of Lange DeGrasse and Ellen Comeaux of Bathurst and the older brother of actor Samuel DeGrasse. The family had a total of 11 siblings.
Initially starting his career as a journalist, Joseph soon developed a passion for the theater and began working as a stage actor.
In 1910, DeGrasse appeared in his first motion picture. Although he would go on to act in 13 films and write two screenplays, his primary interest lay in directing.
While working at Universal Pictures in Hollywood, Joseph met and married Ida May Park, one of the few female directors at the time.
In 1915 he became a founding member of the Motion Picture Directors Association, a forerunner to today’s Directors Guild of America.
In 1924, actor Lon Chaney said of the De Grasses:
“Joe and Sam De Grasses are two of the most talented personalities in today’s film industry. Joe, a very skilled actor, is also the consummate director, firm in his demands yet gentle in his way of dealing with many different temperaments to be found in the movie industry. Sam is the only actor I know who can horrify an audience without make-up and without grotesque posturing and playing to the camera. He is the only actor I know who pulls teeth on the set in between takes. A rare pair, they have given the industry not one but two dimensions”.
Joseph DeGrasse passed away in Eagle Rock, California in 1940. He collapsed while walking on the street and was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead due to a heart attack.
Over the course of his career, DeGrasse directed a total of 86 films:
- Her Bounty (1914)
- The Pipes o’ Pan (1914)
- Virtue Is Its Own Reward (1914)
- Her Life’s Story (1914)
- Lights and Shadows (1914)
- The Lion, the Lamb, the Man (1914)
- A Night of Thrills (1914)
- Her Escape (1914)
- The Sin of Olga Brandt (1915)
- The Star of the Sea (1915)
- The Measure of a Man (1915)
- The Threads of Fate (1915)
- When the Gods Played a Badger Game (1915)
- Such Is Life (1915)
- Where the Forest Ends (1915)
- Outside the Gates (1915)
- All for Peggy (1915)
- The Desert Breed (1915)
- Maid of the Mist (1915)
- The Grind (1915)
- The Girl of the Night (1915)
- An Idyll of the Hills (1915)
- The Stronger Mind (1915)
- Steady Company (1915)
- Bound on the Wheel (1915)
- Mountain Justice (1915)
- The Pine’s Revenge (1915)
- The Fascination of the Fleur de Lis (1915)
- Alas and Alack (1915)
- A Mother’s Atonement (1915)
- Lon of Lone Mountain (1915)
- The Millionaire Paupers (1915)
- Under a Shadow (1915)
- Father and the Boys (1915)
- Stronger Than Death (1915)
- Dolly’s Scoop (1916)
- The Grip of Jealousy (1916)
- Tangled Hearts (1916)
- The Gilded Spider (1916)
- Bobbie of the Ballet (1916)
- The Grasp of Greed (1916)
- The Mark of Cain (1916)
- If My Country Should Call (1916)
- The Place Beyond the Winds (1916)
- The Price of Silence (1916)
- The Piper’s Price (1917)
- Hell Morgan’s Girl (1917)
- The Mask of Love (1917)
- The Girl in the Checkered Coat (1917)
- A Doll’s House (1917)
- Pay Me! (1917)
- Triumph (1917)
- The Empty Gun (1917)
- Anything Once (1917)
- The Scarlet Car (1917)
- A Broadway Scandal (1918)
- The Brand of Lopez (1920)
- Bonnie May (1920)
- Thundergate (1923)
- Flowing Gold (1924)
