In a mid-1920s theater, a figure at an organ turns to reveal a skeletal face so terrifying that patrons scream and faint in the aisles. The actor behind that panic developed his greatest tool before he could speak a word. This deep dive explores the life of Leonidas Frank Chaney, the man of a thousand faces, and how the hearing child of two deaf parents turned personal tragedy and physical agony into early Hollywood's most transformative career.

We look at a Colorado Springs childhood lived through sign language and physical expression, years in vaudeville, the 1913 incident in which his wife Cleva swallowed mercuric chloride and the scandal that locked him out of respectable theater. Then we follow him into Universal's assembly line with a tackle box of grease paint, collodion and fish skin, the executive who said he would never be worth m ...