Bela Lugosi is an actor.
Bela Lugosi . He had roles in several films in Weimar Germany before arriving in the United States as a seaman on a merchant ship . In 1927 , he appeared as Count Dracula in a Broadway adaptation of Bram Stoker 's novel . He later appeared in the classic 1931 film Dracula by Universal Pictures . Through the 1930s , he occupied an important niche in popular horror films , with their East European setting , but his Hungarian accent limited his repertoire , and he tried unsuccessfully to avoid typecasting . Among his pairings with Karloff , only in The Black Cat ( 1934 ) , The Raven ( 1935 ) , and Son of Frankenstein ( 1939 ) did he perform major roles again , and , even in The Raven , Karloff received top billing despite Lugosi performing the lead role .