 One of Tearle's most memorable screen roles was in Alfred Hitchcock's "The 39 Steps" (1935), in which he portrayed Professor Jordan, a seemingly respectable country squire whose missing finger unmasks him as an enemy agent.He was cast as an RAF gunner in "One of Our Aircraft Is Missing" (1942), a German General in "Undercover (film)" (1943), an aging First World War veteran in "Medal for the General" (1944) and as Franklin D. Roosevelt in "The Beginning or the End", MGM's 1946 account of the Manhattan Project.Tearle made his Broadway theatre debut in "Carnival" in 1919.