Jack Warden

Jack Warden was born John H. Lebzelter (German for "honey-cake baker") on September 18, 1920 in Newark, New Jersey to a Jewish father, Jack Warden Lebzelter, and his Irish wife, Laura M. Lebzelter (nee Costello). Raised in Louisville, Kentucky, at the age of 17, young Jack Lebzelter was expelled from Louisville's Du Pont Manuel High School for repeatedly fighting. Good with his fists, he turned professional, boxing as a welterweight under the name "Johnny Costello", adopting his mother's maiden name. (In an interview, Jack Warden said that his mother had tried to suppress his identification with Judaism, possibly out of a misguided ... Read more