List of Famous people who died in 1961

Eily Malyon was an English character actress from about 1900 to the 1940s. She had career on the British stage before coming to Hollywood to perform in motion pictures.

Esther Dale was an American actress of the stage and screen, best known perhaps for her role as Aunt Genevieve in the 1935 Shirley Temple vehicle, Curly Top.

Fay Roope was a Harvard graduate and a character actor who appeared in American theater in New York City from the 1920s through 1950, and in American film and television from 1949 through 1961.

Frank Fay was an American vaudeville comedian and film and stage actor. For a time he was a well known and influential star, but he later fell into obscurity, in part because of his abrasive personality and fascist political views. He is considered an important pioneer in stand-up comedy. He played the role of "Elwood P. Dowd" in the Broadway play Harvey by the American playwright Mary Coyle Chase. He is best known as actress Barbara Stanwyck's first husband. Their troubled marriage is thought by some to be the basis of the 1937 film A Star Is Born, in which the previously unknown wife shoots to stardom while her husband's career goes into sharp decline. Fay was notorious for his bigotry and alcoholism, and according to the American Vaudeville Museum, "even when sober, he was dismissive and unpleasant, and he was disliked by most of his contemporaries".

George Schnéevoigt was a Danish film director, cinematographer, and actor of the 1910s to early 1940s. Schnéevoigt was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, on 23 December 1893 to the Finnish-born photographer and actress Siri Schnéevoigt, and Hermann Friedrich Fischer. He was the father of photographer Alf Schnéevoigt.

Georges Baconnet (1892–1961) was a French stage and film actor. He was a member of the Comédie-Française from 1946 to his death.

Georges Henri Manzana Pissarro (1871–1961) was a French artist who worked in Impressionist and Post-Impressionist styles. He was also a designer of textiles, decorative objects, furniture and glassware.

Émile Henriot was a French chemist notable for being the first to show definitely that potassium and rubidium are naturally radioactive.