Before Joseph Cotten became a movie actor he worked as an advertiser, actor at a theatre and also as a theatre critic. He got his chance at the movies because of his friendship with Orson Welles which lasted since their time at the Federal Theatre (1936) and at the Mercury's Company (1937). In Citizen Kane, as 'Jed Leland'. In the following years Cotten had important characterizations like in The Third Man. Because of his age he played later on mainly minor parts and had after 1967 various appearences in TV productions.


Retired from acting in the early 1980s after a stroke and a laryngectomy. Like Orson Welles, he has appeared in the top films of both the American Film Institute and the British Film Institute; for AFI it was Citizen Kane (1941) as Jedediah Leland and for BFI, its The Third Man (1949) as Holly Martins. Was cast as C.K. Dexter Haven in the original 1939 Broadway production of Philip Barry's play Philadelphia StoryZ with Katharine Hepburn. When Hepburn, who owned the rights, sold the story to MGM, Cary Grant was cast in the part. Served as best man at Orson Welles's wedding to Rita Hayworth. His brother, Sam, passed away on February 27, 2010 in Winchester, Virginia, at the age of 90.