Beery was considered misanthropic and difficult to work with by many of his colleagues. Robert Young (actor) described Beery as a "shitty person". On set he'd often never bother to learn his lines and instead choose to take from other actors characters and then resent it when his theft was pointed out. When prompting for another actor's close-up, Beery would read the wrong lines, making it harder for his co-stars to meet their marks. Beery was "loathed by everybody, and happily oblivious."