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Soft-spoken small-part actor Clinton Sundberg was a minor player on the MGM payroll during the late 1940s and '50s. A one-time teacher who turned his focus to character acting, his rather meek countenance and light, raspy tenor tones befitted a comfortable niche playing courteous servile types in mostly sentimental tales. As various desk clerks, waiters and menservants (and maybe a couple of out-of-character villains), he seemed to back up a large roster of MGM's biggest stars in musicals (he himself didn't sing) including June Allyson in Good News (1947), Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in The Barkleys of Broadway (1949) and Betty Hutton in Annie Get Your Gun (1950), to name a few. Of these, he may be best remembered as Judy Garland's benevolent bartender in Easter Parade (1948). Other more prominent parts came as a snippy butler in The Girl Next Door (1953) and private eye J. Scott Smart's "Man Friday" in the Universal mystery programmer The Fat Man (1951).
A Broadway veteran, Sundberg's better known stage roles were as Mortimer in "Arsenic and Old Lace" and Mr. Kraler in "The Diary of Anne Frank." TV allowed him to be a bit more assertive in personality while also showing his intelligent side as assorted doctor and professor types. Sundberg went on to appear in dozens of voice-overs and commercials in the 1970s. He died of heart failure in 1987 shortly after his 84th birthday.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Mean, miserly and miserable-looking, they didn't come packaged with a more annoying and irksome bow than Charles Lane. Glimpsing even a bent smile from this unending sourpuss was extremely rare, unless one perhaps caught him in a moment of insidious glee after carrying out one of his many nefarious schemes. Certainly not a man's man on film or TV by any stretch, Lane was a character's character. An omnipresent face in hundreds of movies and TV sitcoms, the scrawny, scowling, beady-eyed, beak-nosed killjoy who usually could be found peering disdainfully over a pair of specs, brought out many a comic moment simply by dampening the spirit of his nemesis. Whether a Grinch-like rent collector, IRS agent, judge, doctor, salesman, reporter, inspector or neighbor from hell, Lane made a comfortable acting niche for himself making life wretched for someone somewhere.
He was born Charles Gerstle Levison on January 26, 1905 in San Francisco and was actually one of the last survivors of that city's famous 1906 earthquake. He started out his working-class existence selling insurance but that soon changed. After dabbling here and there in various theatre shows, he was prodded by a friend, director Irving Pichel, to consider acting as a profession. In 1928 he joined the Pasadena Playhouse company, which, at the time, had built up a solid reputation for training stage actors for the cinema. While there he performed in scores of classical and contemporary plays. He made his film debut anonymously as a hotel clerk in Smart Money (1931) starring Edward G. Robinson and James Cagney and was one of the first to join the Screen Actor's Guild. He typically performed many of his early atmospheric roles without screen credit and at a cost of $35 per day, but he always managed to seize the moment with whatever brief bit he happened to be in. People always remembered that face and raspy drone of a voice. He appeared in so many pictures (in 1933 alone he made 23 films!), that he would occasionally go out and treat himself to a movie only to find himself on screen, forgetting completely that he had done a role in the film. By 1947 the popular character actor was making $750 a week.
Among his scores of cookie-cutter crank roles, Lane was in top form as the stage manager in Twentieth Century (1934); the Internal Revenue Service agent in You Can't Take It with You (1938); the newsman in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939); the rent collector in It's a Wonderful Life (1946); the recurring role of Doc Jed Prouty, in the "Ellery Queen" film series of the 1940s, and as the draft board driver in No Time for Sergeants (1958). A minor mainstay for Frank Capra, the famed director utilized the actor's services for nine of his finest films, including a few of the aforementioned plus Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Arsenic and Old Lace (1944) and State of the Union (1948).
Lane's career was interrupted for a time serving in the Coast Guard during WWII. In post-war years, he found TV quite welcoming, settling there as well for well over four decades. Practically every week during the 1950s and 1960s, one could find him displaying somewhere his patented "slow burn" on a popular sitcom - Topper (1953), The Real McCoys (1957), The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis (1959), Mister Ed (1961), Bewitched (1964), Get Smart (1965), Gomer Pyle: USMC (1964), The Munsters (1964), Green Acres (1965), The Flying Nun (1967) and Maude (1972). He hassled the best sitcom stars of the day, notably Lucille Ball (an old friend from the RKO days with whom he worked multiple times), Andy Griffith and Danny Thomas. Recurring roles on Dennis the Menace (1959), The Beverly Hillbillies (1962) and Soap (1977) made him just as familiar to young and old alike. Tops on the list had to be his crusty railroad exec Homer Bedloe who periodically caused bucolic bedlam with his nefarious schemes to shut down the Hooterville Cannonball on Petticoat Junction (1963). He could also play it straightforward and serious as demonstrated by his work in The Twilight Zone (1959), Perry Mason (1957), Little House on the Prairie (1974) and L.A. Law (1986).
A benevolent gent in real life, Lane was seen less and less as time went by. One memorable role in his twilight years was as the rueful child pediatrician who chose to overlook the warning signs of child abuse in the excellent TV movie Sybil (1976). One of Lane's last on-screen roles was in the TV-movie remake of The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes (1995) at age 90. Just before his death he was working on a documentary on his long career entitled "You Know the Face".
Cinematically speaking, perhaps the good ones do die young, for the irascible Lane lived to be 102 years old. He died peacefully at his Brentwood, California home, outliving his wife of 71 years, former actress Ruth Covell, who died in 2002. A daughter, a son and a granddaughter all survived him.- Actor
- Director
Curt Conway was born on 4 May 1913 in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. He was an actor and director, known for The Twilight Zone (1959), Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre (1963) and Play of the Week (1959). He was married to Gail Leonard, Sandra Francis, Kim Stanley and Marilynn June Frahm. He died on 10 April 1974 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Bill Quinn was born on 6 May 1912 in New York City, New York, USA. He was an actor, known for Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983), Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989) and The Birds (1963). He was married to Mary Catherine Roden. He died on 29 April 1994 in Camarillo, California, USA.- Ed Peck was born on 26 March 1917 in Brooklyn, New York, USA. He was an actor, known for Bullitt (1968), The Last Unicorn (1982) and Heaven Can Wait (1978). He was married to Phyllis Anne Houston. He died on 12 September 1992 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Dan Tobin's career in Hollywood as a small part supporting player spanned three decades, beginning in 1939. Adding to his slightly shifty appearance -- squinty eyes, high cheekbones and generally sporting a thin moustache -- was a fussy, bumptious manner, which made him ideal typecasting as supercilious, miserly, smugly conceited or obsequious types. Though Tobin's screen personae could be sinister, or at least underhanded, they also often provided comic relief, as, for instance, his somewhat camp, bow-tied employee Gerald Howe in Woman of the Year (1942). On stage, he had his biggest hit in Philip Barry's classic comedy play "The Philadelphia Story" (Broadway (1939-40), playing the part of Alexander 'Sandy' Lord.
By the mid-1950's, Tobin had drifted from films towards guest appearances in early anthology series and sitcoms on television. He had a regular spot in the final season of Perry Mason (1957) as Raymond Burr's restaurateur friend Terrance Clay. As the ideal character to be deflated, he was also employed to good comic effect in several episodes of Bewitched (1964) and The Ghost & Mrs. Muir (1968). Tobin retired from acting in 1977 and died five years later at the age of 72. He had been married to TV scriptwriter Jean Holloway. - Actor
- Soundtrack
The son of a Georgia minister, Edward Andrews debuted on stage in 1926 at age 12. By 1935, he had landed on Broadway. A solid character actor, his amiable demeanor made him a natural for the jovial, grandfatherly types and genial, small-town businessmen he often played, but his very large physique and peering eyes, partially hidden behind ever-present large-framed eyeglasses, served him well when cast as a heavy, i.e. a sinister character like a corrupt businessman or official, or worse. He was memorable as the glad-handing, charming but murderous leader of a corrupt political machine in The Phenix City Story (1955) and, later in his career, as Molly Ringwald's solicitous grandfather in Sixteen Candles (1984).- Actor
- Producer
Joseph Ruskin was born on 14 April 1924 in Haverhill, Massachusetts, USA. He was an actor and producer, known for Smokin' Aces (2006), Star Trek: Insurrection (1998) and The Scorpion King (2002). He was married to Barbara Greene and Patricia Herd. He died on 28 December 2013 in Santa Monica, California, USA.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Forever embraced as the mumbling, bumbling Aunt Clara on the Bewitched (1964) television series, endearing character actress Marion Lorne had a five-decade-long career on the stage before ever becoming a familiar TV household name.
Born Marion Lorne MacDougall on August 12, 1883 (other sources list 1885 and 1888), she grew up in her native Pennsylvania, the daughter of Scottish and English immigrants. Trained at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York, she appeared in stock shows, and was on the Broadway boards by 1905. She married English playwright Walter C. Hackett and performed in many of his plays throughout the 1920s and 1930s, including "Hyde Park Corner" and "The Gay Adventure". They at one point settled in England where they co-founded the Whitehall Theater. It was there that Marion began to sharpen and patent her fidgety comedy eccentrics in such plays as "Pansy's Arabian Knight," "Sorry You've Been Troubled," "Espionage" and "London After Dark". Upon Hackett's death in 1944, she returned to the States and again, after a brief retirement, became a hit in such tailor-made stage shows as "Harvey".
Marion made a definitive impression via her movie debut at age 60+ in Alfred Hitchcock's immortal suspenser Strangers on a Train (1951) as murderer Robert Walker's clueless, smothering mother. Surprisingly Hollywood used her only a couple more times on film after that auspicious beginning -- a grievously sad waste of a supremely talented comedienne. Marion wisely turned to TV instead and proved a dithery delight in such sitcoms as Mister Peepers (1952) and Sally (1957), gaining quirky status as well as part of the comedy ensemble on The Garry Moore Show (1958).
It was, however, her role as Elizabeth Montgomery's befuddled, muttering, doorknob-collecting witch-aunt on Bewitched (1964) -- whether bouncing into walls or conjuring up some unintended piece of witchcraft -- that put a lasting sheen on her long career. For that role she deservedly won an Emmy trophy for "Best Supporting Actress" -- albeit posthumously. Montgomery accepted her award. Sadly, Marion succumbed to a heart attack on May 9, 1968, just ten days before the actual ceremony. Elizabeth Montgomery gave a touching acceptance speech on her behalf.- Actor
- Additional Crew
- Soundtrack
Popular American character actor of amusing appearance and voice whose long career led from dozens of highly enjoyable onscreen performances to world-wide familiarity as the voice of numerous Walt Disney animated films. Born in the American Deep South to grocer Sterling P. Holloway Sr. and Rebecca Boothby Holloway, he had a younger brother, Boothby. Holloway spent his early years as an actor playing comic juveniles on the stage. His bushy reddish-blond hair and trademark near-falsetto voice made him a natural for sound pictures, and he acted in scores of talkies, although he had made his picture debut in silents. His physical image and voice relegated him almost exclusively to comic roles, but in 1945, director Lewis Milestone cast him more or less against type in the classic war film A Walk in the Sun (1945), where Holloway's portrayal of a reluctant soldier was quite notable. He played frequently on television, becoming familiar to baby-boomers in a recurring role as Uncle Oscar on Adventures of Superman (1952), and later in television series of his own. His later work as the voice of numerous characters in Disney cartoons brought him new audiences and many fans, especially for his voicing of beloved Winnie the Pooh. He died in 1992.- Actress
- Soundtrack
A New York City native, Saviola graduated from the prestigious High School of Music and Art in Manhattan and dropped out of college after a year in order to learn acting. She was lead singer of a female rock band in NYC in 1970, the Margo Lewis Explosion. She was signed by a disco label in the late 1970s. She worked in theatrical productions in New York for 25 years, before appearing in various television series, including "The Heights", "Civil Wars", and "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine". She has also appeared in three Woody Allen movies.- Ivor Francis, besides his many roles on television and at the movies, acted on radio as well in shows like "Fibber McGee and Molly"; on Broadway in shows such as "J.B." with Christopher Plummer, and came west to California when New York plays turned mostly to musicals. He worked in films, television and in day-time soaps as well. In addition, he operated the Ivor Francis Actors Workshop in West Hollywood and, among the class members, were Ben Murphy (Alias Smith and Jones (1971)); Linda Haynes (Brubaker (1980) & The Drowning Pool (1975)); Mary Douvan (Sandra Dee's mother) and the Goldrup brothers, Tom Goldrup and Jim Goldrup, who appear on stage in Santa Cruz County, California, stage productions.
- Roger C. Carmel, who was born September 27, 1932, was named after his grandfather, Roger Charles, who carved the horses for the carousel in New York's Central Park. He became an actor and won television immortality by appearing as Harry Mudd in two classic Star Trek (1966) episodes, "I, Mudd" and "Mudd's Women" (Carmel was one of the few guest actors on Star Trek (1966) to appear in more than one episode as the same character).
After appearing on stage, Carmel began working steadily on television in the early 1960s as a character actor, appearing on both dramas ("Route 66") and situation-comedies (The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961). In 1967, he was cast as the husband of Kaye Ballard's character on NBC's Desi Arnaz Productions' sitcom The Mothers-In-Law (1967), Desi Arnazs first production since I Love Lucy (1951). NBC was disappointed by the mediocre ratings of The Mothers-In-Law (1967), and almost canceled it. It picked the show up for a second season after rival network ABC expressed interest in the show, but NBC informed Arnaz that they would not give any additional money for the show. Traditionally, salaries are increased when a TV show is picked up for a new season, and all the actors' contracts specifically called for raises in the event of renewal. Arnaz, who was also producer, director, and writer, called together the cast and crew and told them that although the series had been renewed, there was no money for salary increases.
According to Carmel's own recollection, Arnaz was already drawing down multiple salaries on the program, and would shortly cast himself as a supporting character in the series, thus drawing another salary, although Carmel didn't know that at the time. Arnaz elicited a promise from the creative people, the crew and the actors to forgo salary increases to keep the show on the air. All the actors agreed but one. Carmel told Arnaz he would quit unless he received a raise, as per his contract. In a contemporaneous account of the incident, Carmel said, "Desi called me and put it on a personal basis. I didn't feel it should be done that way - it was very unfair of him. Then Desi and the Morris Agency threatened I would be replaced. Kaye Ballard and Eve Arden also called me and asked me to go along, but I wouldn't."
Arnaz's response to Carmel's ultimatum was dismissive. "Where else is he going to make two thousand dollars a week?", the producer asked rhetorically. If Arnaz's Desilu production company gave in to Carmel, it would be faced with giving all the cast members a raise, which was financially unviable with the money on offer from NBC. Arnaz was forced to terminate Carmel, who was replaced by Richard Deacon for the second season. The show had poor ratings and was canceled following its second season.
After leaving "The Mothers-in-Law", Carmel's acting career suffered. Other than his Harry Mudd appearances, Carmel's most memorable gig on TV was as the very campy guest villain Colonel Gumm on Batman (1966) in 1967. He made regular appearances on the syndicated quiz TV show "Stump The Stars" from 1968-70. Carmel even reprised his most famous role, that of Harry Mudd, in an episode of the animated version of "Star Trek" (1973-75), an indicator of the direction of his future career. However, during the 1970s, he could not secure another regular role as an ongoing character on a TV series, though he continued to appear regularly on sitcoms, mostly in ethnic roles, including appearances on "All In The Family", "Chico and The Man", and "Three's Company". He also appeared in B-movie bombs, including the Jerry Lewis flop "Hardly Working" (1981).
At the dawn of the new decade of the 1980s, Carmel finally got another opportunity for the first time in a dozen years, when he was cast as a regular on the network program Fitz and Bones (1981). An hour-long drama starring the TV comedy-musical duo The Smothers Brothers as investigative reporters, the show was a ratings failure, lasting only one month. After this monumental flop ("Fitz and Bones" was the lowest-rated series for the entire 1981-82 season), character parts dried up and Carmel was reduced to doing voice-over work for children's cartoons, including "The Transformers".
Carmel's last triumph as an actor was in commercials. He was a huge hit in advertising playing Senor Naugles, a faux-Mexican Colonel Sanders clone, for the West Coast region Mexican fast food chain Naugles. The commercials were a success and the chain began expanding rapidly. However, both the renewed success of Carmel and the fresh success of the chain were, sadly, to prove short-lived.
According to acquaintances, Carmel suffered chest pains on the night he died and called a cab to take him to the hospital. When the cab showed up at his Hollywood high-rise but Carmel did not come down to get it, the doorman sent the cab away, never inquiring why he failed to appear. Carmel was found dead on the floor of his apartment the next morning, November 11, 1986. While there were rumors that he committed suicide (he was rumored to be a recreational drug user), the official cause of death was listed as hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a disease of the heart muscle in which the organ becomes enlarged. The condition leads to congestive heart failure. Carmel was only 54 years old. He was interred in Glendale, New York.
After Carmel's death, Naugles failed to come up with another successful ad campaign, and eventually, its financial fortunes changed. It was eventually acquired by rival, Del Taco. - Actor
- Soundtrack
Thin, fidgety James Millholin made a career out of playing dyspeptic bureaucrats, nervous hotel clerks and other officious authority types. Somewhat reminiscent of Edward Everett Horton or Franklin Pangborn, Millhollin's pinched face, somewhat pop eyes and flighty mannerisms fit those roles like a glove, one of the best examples being the army psychiatrist driven to distraction trying to give Andy Griffith a psychological examination in No Time for Sergeants (1958) (a role he also played on Broadway). Born in Peoria, IL, Millhollin had a career on the Broadway stage and did much television in the early 1950s before breaking into films. After retiring from the industry he moved to Mississippi, where he died in 1993.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Burt Mustin was a salesman most of his life, but got his first taste of show business as the host of a weekly radio variety show on KDKA Pittsburgh in 1921. He appeared onstage in "Detective Story" at Sombrero Playhouse in Phoenix Arizona, and played the janitor in the movie version, (Detective Story (1951)), after moving to Hollywood. Hundreds of screen appearances later, he announced his retirement while filming an episode of Phyllis (1975). In the episode, his character married Mother Dexter, played by actress Judith Lowry. Lowry died one month before, and Mustin died one month after the episode aired.- Actor
- Writer
- Soundtrack
Hal Smith was born on 24 August 1916 in Petoskey, Michigan, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for The Great Race (1965), The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (1977) and The Andy Griffith Show (1960). He was married to Vivian M. Angstadt. He died on 28 January 1994 in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Herbert Anderson was born on 30 March 1917 in Oakland, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Battleground (1949), The Bride Came C.O.D. (1941) and The Male Animal (1942). He was married to Mary Virginia Palmer. He died on 11 June 1994 in Palm Springs, California, USA.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Joseph Kearns was born on 12 February 1907 in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA. He was an actor, known for Alice in Wonderland (1951), Dennis the Menace (1959) and Anatomy of a Murder (1959). He died on 17 February 1962 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actor
- Writer
- Producer
Appeared on the Andy Griffith show after Don Knotts departed. He played a bumbling deputy in the tradition of Barney Fife. After his partnership with George Carlin ended, he teamed with Avery Schreiber after meeting at Chicago's Second City comedy club. Jack appeared on Saturday Night Live In 1977 and turned to writing In in the 1980's.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Whit Bissell came to Hollywood in the 1940s, and by the time he retired he had appeared in more than 200 movies and scores of TV series. He is best known for playing the evil scientist who turned Michael Landon into a half beast in the 1957 cult classic film I Was a Teenage Werewolf (1957). Bissell specialized in playing doctors, military officers and other authority figures. On television he was a regular on Bachelor Father (1957) and The Time Tunnel (1966). He also served on the Screen Actors Guild board of directors for 18 years and represented the actors branch in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences board of governors.- Lovable, laid-back Jesse White made acting seem fun and easy. He was born Jesse Marc Weidenfeld in Buffalo, New York, and was raised in Akron, Ohio. He made his first amateur appearance on the local stage at age 15. Before breaking into professional theater in the 1940s, he held many different jobs, including selling beauty supplies and lingerie. Jesse got his start in vaudeville and burlesque, and eventually reached Broadway in 1943. The following year, he played the rascally, gruff-mannered asylum attendant in Harvey, starring Frank Fay. This role made him famous and he went on to appear with James Stewart in the movie version (Harvey (1950)). The 1950s was a decade of transition to the new medium of television. As a television regular, he did something that had never been done before - he appeared regularly in two series at the same time. In Private Secretary (1953) and The Danny Thomas Show (1953). This record stood for 13 years until Leo G. Carroll appeared simultaneously on The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1964) and The Girl from U.N.C.L.E. (1966)).
One of Jesse's earliest television appearances is a 1961 episode of the sci-fi series Once Upon a Time (1961) in which he played, prophetically enough, The Repairman. Jesse would make guest appearances on dozens of television series, and appear in 60 movies, almost always playing a lovable rascal. Some of his last movie appearances were in the sci-fi movies Pajama Party (1964) and The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini (1966). Then the 50-year-old Jesse seized a terrific career opportunity. From 1968-1989, he would be television's second and longest running Maytag Repairman in a long series of commercials. For this, he made several hundred thousand dollars a year, for just a few days filming. Even though he was semi-retired during this time, Jesse appeared in a dozen movies, his last film being Matinee (1993), which was an homage to some of the 1950s-1960s sci-fi films of which he had been a part. Jesse always seemed to be having as much fun acting as the fans did watching him.
Jesse White died of a heart attack on January 9, 1997, only six days after his 80th birthday. He was interred at Mount Sinai Memorial Park in Los Angeles, California.