George Raft (1895–1980), American film actor, often cast as a sharp-eyed gangster. Born in New York, Raft was a boxer and a ballroom dancer before turning to acting in the late 1920s. He soon became typecast as a gangster, turning in his most memorable performance in Scarface (1932). Raft gained considerable popularity in the 1940s, but in the following decade his career declined. He began appearing in foreign films and starred in his own television series. His later work included a self-satirizing cameo in Some Like It Hot (1959).