Fritz Feld made a career out of being recognizable before audiences could remember his name. Born Fritz Feilchenfeld in Berlin in 1900, he began acting in German theater and silent film as a teenager, came to the United States with Max Reinhardt’s production of The Miracle in the 1920s and stayed. Over the next seven decades he became one of Hollywood’s most durable specialists in brief, sharply drawn characters.

Feld understood the problem of a small role better than most. Late in life he explained that a leading actor might have fifteen scenes and could recover from one weak moment; a character actor entering for a scene or two had to be right immediately. That philosophy describes his radio work as neatly as his film career. A waiter, conductor, doctor or excitable European had to arrive complete in a few lines.

His accent became part of the professional toolkit. Hollywood repeatedly cast Feld as continental clerks, maîtres d’, psychiatrists, musicians and officials. The roles often relied on period ethnic shorthand, but Feld’s speed and precision kept them from being purely decorative. His characters entered with a full tempo already established.

Then came the sound that became more famous than many of the roles. During the Eddie Cantor film If You Knew Susie, Feld developed his trademark mouth-pop by striking his palm against his puckered lips. He later joked that the pop was worth more than a word. It was a visual gesture with an acoustic payoff, which made it perfectly portable across film, television, commercials and radio.

By the time of his death in 1993, accounts credited Feld with hundreds of films and television programs and roughly a thousand radio appearances. He had moved from German silent cinema through American network broadcasting into modern television without needing to reinvent the central skill: make one small entrance specific enough that the audience wants more.