DeVeren Bookwalter's illustrious acting career began with extensive stage work in New York, where he honed his skills before relocating to Los Angeles in the early 1970s to capitalize on the West Coast's abundant acting opportunities.
One of his earliest small roles in his new film career was in the 1971 movie, The Omega Man. Bookwalter's passion for Shakespeare led him to associate with R. Thad Taylor's Shakespeare Society of America in West Hollywood, a unique organization dedicated to performing all of Shakespeare's plays with a pool of talented LA-based actors.
The Shakespeare Society of America was headquartered in a converted Victorian mansion, which boasted several production stages. Bookwalter played the role of Feste the Clown in the society's ambitious production of Twelfth Night in 1971, which featured a talented cast including young British actors Vincent Mongola and Vickery Turner, as well as veteran comedian Avery Schreiber.
When the mansion's owner decided to sell the property in early 1972, Taylor relocated the society to a converted garage a few miles north, where Bookwalter and a team of dedicated volunteers constructed a half-scale model of the Globe Theater.
The society, reconstituted as the LA Globe Theater, continued to strive for its goal of completing Shakespeare's plays, as well as producing new works and modern classics. Bookwalter took on the role of director and star in the society's acclaimed production of Cyrano de Bergerac in 1975, which earned the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Awards for production, direction, and lead performance.
The society completed its Shakespearean canon in the 1976-77 season, after which Bookwalter returned to film work, including the American TV production of Othello in 1981. His most notable movie role was as Bobby Maxwell, the homegrown terrorist leader, in the Clint Eastwood-directed film, The Enforcer, in 1976.
Bookwalter's subsequent work included a steady stint in soap operas from 1982 to 1984, before he eventually returned to New York, where he tragically passed away before his time in 1987.
