George Obrien Typed Letter Signed with Autograph 1928 George O’Brien (April 19, 1899 – September 4, 1985) was an American actor, popular during the silent film era and into the sound film era of the 1930s. He is best known today as the lead actor in F. W. Murnau’s 1927 film Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans and subsequent appearances in a number of Westerns in the 1930s and 1940s.