Dooley Wilson’s piano-playing “Sam” delivers the heart and soul current in Casablanca. Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman and Paul Henreid aside, Wilson is one of the cast members you really and truly remember. He’s easily as vivid and relatable as the reasonably well–paid Claude Rains and Conrad Veidt ($22K and $25K respectively) and yet Wilson snagged only a lousy $5K. Producer Hal Wallis almost certainly exploited Wilson’s situation to the hilt.
