Howard "Howie" Morris (September 4, 1919 – May 21, 2005) was an American comic actor and director who was best known for his role as Ernest T. Bass on The Andy Griffith Show.

Life and career[link]

Morris was born to a Jewish family in The Bronx, New York, the son of Elsie and Hugo Morris, a rubber company executive.^[1] During World War II he was assigned to a US Army Special Services unit where he was the First Sergeant. Maurice Evans was the company commander and Carl Reiner and Werner Klemperer were soldiers in the unit. ^[2] Based in Honolulu, the unit entertained American troops throughout the Pacific.^[3]

He came to prominence in appearances on Sid Caesar's Your Show of Shows (a live sketch comedy television series appearing weekly in the United States, from 1950 to 1954). Morris appeared twice in 1957 in episodes of the short-lived NBC comedy/variety show, The Polly Bergen Show.

Although Morris was a classically trained Shakespearean actor, he is best remembered for playing the wily and over the top "mountain man" character Ernest T. Bass on The Andy Griffith Show. He had lampooned southern accents while in the army at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. He starred in one of the more comical early hour-long Twilight Zone episodes, "I Dream of Genie". Other roles included that of Elmer Kelp in The Nutty Professor, a movie studio clerk in the short film Star Spangled Salesman, and an art appraiser in an episode of The Dick Van Dyke Show.

Voice artist[link]

Morris was first heard in animated cartoons in the early 1960s. He and Allan Melvin teamed up for a 50-episode King Features Syndicate series, Beetle Bailey, for which he and Melvin also wrote a number of episodes. He also provided the voices for Gene Deitch's Academy Award-winning Munro, about a four-year-old boy who was drafted into the Army.

Beginning in 1962, Morris played a variety of voices in many Hanna-Barbera series including The Jetsons as "Jet Screamer" who sang the "Eep opp ork ah ah!" song,^[4] (said to be Morris' first work for Hanna-Barbera) and The Flintstones. He was the original voice of Atom Ant and provided the voice of Mr. Peebles in the Magilla Gorilla series, teaming up again with Allan Melvin who performed the voice for Magilla. In another series Morris was heard as the voice of Breezly Bruin which was similar in tone with the Bill Scott vocalization of Bullwinkle. Morris had a disagreement with Joseph Barbera prior to production of the 1966-1967 season of Magilla Gorilla and Atom Ant and all of his voices were recast, mostly using Don Messick. Years later the two men reconciled and Morris was back doing those voices and others.

Morris also voiced the characters Professor Icenstein and Luigi La Bounci in the animated series Galaxy High. Morris provided the original vocalizations for the Hamburglar ("Robble, robble, robble") in McDonald's 1971 ad campaign, which Morris also directed. He is also remembered by Filmation and Archie Show fans as the voice of Jughead Jones throughout the life of the franchise. Morris also played Wade Duck in the U.S. Acres segment of Garfield and Friends. He played Flem in the Cartoon Network series Cow & Chicken. Morris supplied the voice of the koala in TV commercials for Qantas from 1967 through 1992 (saying the tagline, "I hate Qantas").^[5]

The move to directing[link]

While Morris continued to make himself available for voice and sound effect roles, he also began a new career in voice directing. Among the projects he directed are Police Academy, Richie Rich, Bionic Six, Pole Position, Galaxy High, The Snorks, The Mighty Orbots, Rose Petal Place, The Dogfather, Dragon's Lair, Turbo Teen, Cabbage Patch Kids: First Christmas, Little Clowns of Happytown, The Little Wizards, Space Stars and Kidd Video. Also on The Many Adventures of Winnie The Pooh he did the voice of Gopher and became one of his most famous roles.

In the 1980s he voiced a regular character on the cartoon series Garfield and Friends. On the show, he voiced Wade Duck, a cowardly duck who was said to have had "almost every phobia known to man and some known to duck."

Later career[link]

Mel Brooks occasionally cast Morris in his films. For example, he played Brooks' mentor psychiatrist Dr. Lilloman in the 1977 comedy High Anxiety, the emperor's court spokesman ("Here, wash this!") in History of the World, Part I, and played a bum named Sailor living in the streets in 1991's Life Stinks. In 1984, he played Dr. Zidell in Splash, a film directed by Ron Howard (the two had first worked together on The Andy Griffith Show). He did a brilliant turn with his old friend and trouping partner Sid Caesar as nervous Jewish tailors in the 1998 movie of Ray Bradbury's The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit.

In 1986, he reprised his famous role as Ernest T. Bass in the high-rated TV movie Return to Mayberry. Morris also directed some episodes on Hogan's Heroes.

Death[link]

Morris died on May 21, 2005. He is entombed in Laurel Gardens Wall crypt at Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery in Culver City, California.[1]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Howard Morris at the Internet Movie Database
• Howard Morris at Find a Grave
• Miller, Stephen. "Howard Morris, 85, Comic Actor and Voiceover Artist," The New York Sun, Monday, May 23, 2005.

Sid Caesar
Caesar in 1980
Born	Isaac Sidney Caesar (1922-09-08) September 8, 1922 (age 89) Yonkers, New York
Occupation	Actor, comedian, writer, musician
Years active	1946-2008
Spouse	Florence Levy (m.1943-2010; her death)

Isaac Sidney "Sid" Caesar (born September 8, 1922) is an Emmy award winning American comic actor and writer known for the 1950s television series Your Show of Shows and Caesar's Hour, and to younger generations as Coach Calhoun in Grease and Grease 2.

Early life[link]

Caesar was born in Yonkers, New York, the youngest son of Max Caesar and his wife Ida (née Raphael), Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire who ran a restaurant.^[1][2][3] Caesar would wait on tables and learned to mimic the accents, something he would use throughout his career. He first tried his double-talk with a group of Italians, his head barely reaching above the table. They enjoyed it so much that they sent him over to a group of Poles to repeat it in Polish, and so on with Russians, Hungarians, Frenchmen, Spaniards, Lithuanians and Bulgarians. Despite his apparent fluency in many languages, Caesar can actually speak only English and Yiddish. Sid's older brother David was his comic mentor and "one-man cheering section." They created their earliest family sketches from then current movies like Test Pilot and Wings.

At fourteen, Caesar went to the Catskills as a saxophonist with Mike Cifichello's Swingtime Six and would also occasionally perform in sketches in the Borscht Belt. When he graduated from high school, he left home, intent on a musical career. He arrived in New York City penniless and tried to join the musician's union (later he attended classes at the Juilliard School of Music). He found work at the Vacationland Hotel in Swan Lake in the Catskills. Under the tutelage of Don Appel, the resort's social director, Caesar played in the band and learned to perform comedy, doing three shows a week. In 1939, when World War II was just starting, he enlisted in the United States Coast Guard, and was assigned to play in military revues and shows in Brooklyn, New York.^[4] Vernon Duke, the famous composer of Autumn in New York, April in Paris, and Taking a Chance on Love, was also at the same base and collaborated with Caesar in musical revues.

During the summer of 1942, Caesar met his future wife Florence Levy at the Avon Lodge. After joining the musician's union, he briefly played with Shep Fields, Claude Thornhill, Charlie Spivak, and Benny Goodman.^[5] Caesar's comedy, however, got bigger applause than the musical numbers, and the show's producer asked him to do stand-up between his numbers. While still in the service, Caesar was ordered to Palm Beach, Florida, where Vernon Duke and Howard Dietz were putting together a service revue, Tars and Spars. There he met the civilian director of the show, Max Liebman, later the producer of his first hit television series. Tars and Spars toured nationally, and then a film version was made at Columbia Pictures. He also got a part in The Guilt of Janet Ames. He married Florence Levy on July 17, 1943, and has three children, Michele, Rick, and Karen.

Career[link]

After the war, Caesar and his wife stayed in Hollywood, but despite a few offers to play sidekick roles, Caesar decided to go back to New York, where he got a club date as the opening act for Joe E. Lewis at the Copacabana nightclub. He reunited with Max Liebman, who guided his stage material and presentation. That appearance led to a contract with the William Morris Agency and a nationwide tour. Caesar also performed in a Broadway revue Make Mine Manhattan, which featured The Five Dollar Date, one of his first original pieces in which he sang, acted, double-talked, pantomimed, and wrote the music.

Caesar began his television career when he made an appearance on Milton Berle's Texaco Star Theater. In early 1949, Sid and Max met with Pat Weaver, vice president of television at NBC (and father of Sigourney Weaver), which led to Caesar's appearance in his first series The Admiral Broadway Revue with Imogene Coca. The Friday show, simultaneously broadcast on NBC and the DuMont network (in order for the show to be carried on the only TV station then operating in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania — DuMont's WDTV — the sponsor had to agree to a simulcast) was an immediate success, but its sponsor, Admiral, an appliance company, could not keep up with the demand for its new television sets, so the show was cancelled after 26 weeks on account of its runaway success. According to Caesar, an Admiral executive later told him the company had the choice of building a new factory or continuing their sponsorship of the Revue for another season.

On February 23, 1950, Caesar appeared in the first episode of Your Show of Shows, a Saturday night 90-minute variety program produced by Max Liebman (who had previously produced The Admiral Broadway Revue). The premiere featured Burgess Meredith as guest host, and other musical guests Gertrude Lawrence, Lily Pons, and Robert Merrill. The show launched Caesar into instant stardom and was a mix of scripted and improvised comedy, movie and television satires, Caesar's inimitable double-talk monologues, top musical guests, and large production numbers. The impressive guest list included: Jackie Cooper, Robert Preston, Rex Harrison, Eddie Albert, Michael Redgrave, Basil Rathbone, Charlton Heston, Geraldine Page, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Pearl Bailey, Fred Allen, Benny Goodman, Lena Horne and many other big stars of the time. It was also responsible for bringing together one of the best comedy teams in television history: Caesar, Carl Reiner, Howard Morris, and Imogene Coca. Many prominent writers, denizens of the 'Writer's Room', also got their break creating the show's madcap sketches, including Lucille Kallen, Mel Brooks, Neil Simon, Woody Allen, Michael Stewart, Mel Tolkin, Sheldon Keller and Larry Gelbart. Sid Caesar won his first Emmy in 1952. In 1951 and 1952, he was voted the United States' Best Comedian by Motion Picture Daily's TV poll. The show ended after 160 episodes on June 5, 1954. The movie My Favorite Year was a fictional comedic account of a show similar to Your Show of Shows — and the favorite year was 1954.

Just a few months later, Sid Caesar returned with Caesar's Hour, a one-hour sketch/variety show with Morris, Reiner, a young Bea Arthur, and much of the seasoned crew. Nanette Fabray replaced Imogene Coca who left to star in her own short-lived series. Ultimate creative and technical control was now totally in Caesar's hands. The show moved to the larger Century Theater, which allowed longer, more sophisticated productions and the weekly budget doubled to $125,000. The premier on September 27, 1954 featured Gina Lollobrigida.

Contemporary movies, foreign movies, theater, television shows and even opera all became targets of satire by the writing team, whose frenetic and competitive spirit produced some of the best comedy in television history. Often the publicity generated by the sketches boosted the box office of the original productions. Some notable sketches included: "From Here to Obscurity" (From Here to Eternity), "Aggravation Boulevard" (Sunset Boulevard), "Hat Basterson" (Bat Masterson), and "No West For the Wicked" (Stagecoach). Even silent movies were parodied, which showed off the impressive pantomime skills of the entire ensemble. They also performed some recurring sketches. "The Hickenloopers" were television's first bickering couple, predating The Honeymooners. As "The Professor", Caesar was the daffy expert who bluffed his way through his interviews with earnest roving reporter Carl Reiner. In its various incarnations, "The Professor" could be Gut von Fraidykat (mountain-climbing expert), Ludwig von Spacebrain (space expert), or Ludwig von Henpecked (marriage expert). Later, "The Professor" evolved into Mel Brooks' "The Two Thousand Year Old Man". The most prominent recurring sketch on the show was "The Commuters", featuring Caesar, Reiner and Morris involved with everyday working and suburban life situations. Years later the sketch "Sneaking through the Sound Barrier", a parodyof the British film, The Sound Barrier, was run continuously as part of a display on supersonic flight at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.

Everything was performed live, including the commercials, which only took up seven minutes of the one-hour show, as compared to today's shows, which average about 22 minutes of commercials per hour. Prominent Hollywood movie stars (or their agents) clamored to be on the show, but in reality doing a sketch in one shot with no cue cards and minimal rehearsal time was a challenge for many of the stars used to languid preparation and numerous retakes.

In his book Caesar's Hours, Caesar describes the essence of his comedy as 'working both sides of the street', the deliberate blending of comedy and pathos in the tradition of the great comedians of the 1920s and 1930s — his idols Charlie Chaplin, Laurel and Hardy, Buster Keaton, and W. C. Fields. His sympathetic portrayal of the follies and foibles of his characters resonated with a weekly live audience of over 60 million Americans. He was a master of impeccable timing, careful preparation, and quick-witted flexibility, relying heavily on an endless variety of rapidly changing facial expressions and a strong physical presence. Though by nature shy, Caesar reveled in his characters. The most difficult moment of the show for Caesar was the opening, when he had to say 'good evening ladies and gentlemen'.

Caesar's Hour was followed by Sid Caesar Invites You, briefly reuniting Caesar and Coca in 1958, and in 1963 with several As Caesar Sees It specials, which evolved into the 1963-'64 Sid Caesar Show, which alternated with Edie Adams in Here's Edie. Caesar also teamed up with Edie Adams in the Broadway show Little Me, a successful Neil Simon play, with choreography by Bob Fosse and music by Cy Coleman in which Sid played eight parts with 32 costume changes. Caesar and Edie Adams played a husband and wife drawn into a mad race to find buried money in the mega-movie-comedy It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World.

Later years[link]

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Caesar continued to make occasional television and night club appearances and starred in several movies including Silent Movie, History of the World, Part I, Airport 1975 and as Coach Calhoun in Grease and its sequel, Grease 2, in 1982. In 1971 he starred opposite Carol Channing and a young Tommy Lee Jones in the Broadway show Four on a Garden. In 1973, Sid and Max Liebman mined their own personal kinescopes from Your Show of Shows (NBC had 'lost' the studio copies) and they produced a feature film Ten From Your Show of Shows, a compilation of some of their best sketches. In 1974, Caesar said, "I'd like to be back every week" on TV and appeared in the NBC skit-based comedy television pilot called, Hamburgers.^[6] In 1977, after blanking out during a stage performance of Neil Simon's The Last of the Red Hot Lovers, Sid gave up alcohol 'cold turkey'. His autobiography, Where Have I Been, published in 1983 and his second book, Caesar's Hours, both chronicle his struggle to overcome alcoholism and barbiturates. In 1983, Sid hosted Season 8, episode 12 of Saturday Night Live where he received a standing ovation to start the show and was awarded with a plaque that declared him as an honorary member to conclude the show (He is the only host to receive this honor). In 1986, Caesar appeared as Frosh the Jailer in Die Fledermaus at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.^{[citation needed]}

Although advancing in age, Caesar has remained active by appearing in movies, television shows, at award shows and autograph signings. In 1995 he appeared in the movie The Great Mom Swap. In 1996 the Writers Guild of America, West reunited Caesar with nine of his writers from Your Show of Shows and Caesar's Hour for a special, two-hour panel discussion featuring head writer Mel Tolkin, Caesar, Carl Reiner, Aaron Ruben, Larry Gelbart, Mel Brooks, Neil Simon, Danny Simon, Sheldon Keller, and Gary Belkin. The event was taped, and later broadcast on PBS in the United States and the BBC in the UK. It has since been made available on DVD.^[7] In 1997, he made a guest appearance in Vegas Vacation and The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit in 1998 based on a Ray Bradbury novel. Also that year, Caesar joined fellow television icons Bob Hope and Milton Berle at the 50th anniversary of the Primetime Emmy Awards, where the three were greeted with a long standing ovation. He reprised his famous foreign dub skit on the November 21, 2001 episode of Whose Line Is It Anyway?, to which he was received with an extended standing ovation by the crowd, as well as a surprise birthday cake from the cast and crew. In 2003, he joined Edie Adams and Marvin Kaplan at a 40th anniversary celebration for It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World.^[8] In 2004, Caesar's second autobiography, Caesar's Hours, was published, and in March 2006, Caesar was presented with the 'Pioneer Award' at the 2006 TV Land Awards. Caesar performed his famous double-talk for over five minutes.^[9]

Awards[link]

See also[link]

• Wayne Lamb, dancer in the Make Mine Manhattan

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Sid Caesar and Eddy Friedfeld, Caesar's Hours: My Life in Comedy, with Love and Laughter, January 30, 2005.

External links[link]

• Official Sid Caesar Website
• Sid Caesar at the Internet Movie Database
• Sid Caesar at the Internet Broadway Database
• Sid Caesar at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Sid Caesar at AllRovi
• Sid Caesar Biography from Museum of Broadcast Communications
• Sid Caesar Biography from New York Times

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (June 2011)

Carl Reiner
Reiner in 1976
Born	(1922-03-20) March 20, 1922 (age 90) Bronx, New York, U.S.
Occupation	Actor, comedian, director, producer, writer
Years active	1948–present
Spouse	Estelle Reiner (1914-2008; deceased)

Carl Reiner (born March 20, 1922)^[1] is an American actor, film director, producer, writer and comedian. He has won nine Emmy Awards and one Grammy Award during his career.

Early life[link]

Reiner was born in the Bronx, New York, the son of Bessie (née Mathias) and Irving Reiner, who was a watchmaker.^[2] His parents were Jewish immigrants, his father from Romania and his mother from Austria.^[3] When he was sixteen, his older brother Charlie read in the New York Daily News about a free dramatic workshop being put on by the Works Progress Administration and told him about it. He had been working as a machinist fixing sewing machines. He credits Charlie with changing his career plans.^[4]

Career[link]

This biographical section of an article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (June 2011)

Reiner at the Emmy Awards, September 1989

Reiner performed in several Broadway musicals, including Inside U.S.A., and Alive and Kicking, and had the lead role in Call Me Mister. In 1950, he was cast by producer Max Leibman in Sid Caesar's Your Show of Shows, appearing on air in skits while also working alongside writers such as Mel Brooks and Neil Simon. He also worked on Caesar's Hour with Brooks, Simon, Larry Gelbart, Mel Tolkin, Mike Stewart, Aaron Ruben, Sheldon Keller and Gary Belkin.

Starting in 1960, on the Steve Allen Show, Reiner teamed with Mel Brooks as a comedy duo. Their performances on stage and television included Reiner playing the straight man to Brooks' 2000 Year Old Man character. The routine eventually expanded into a series of five comedy albums and a 1975 animated TV special.

In 1959, Reiner developed a television pilot, Head of the Family, based on his experience on the Caesar shows. However, the network didn't like Reiner in the lead role. In 1961, it was recast and retitled The Dick Van Dyke Show, and became an iconic series, making stars of his lead actors Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore. In addition to writing many of the episodes, Reiner occasionally appeared as temperamental show host "Alan Brady", who ruthlessly browbeats his brother-in-law (played by Richard Deacon). The show ran from 1961 to 1966. In 1966, he co-starred in the Norman Jewison film The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming.

Reiner began his directing career on the Van Dyke show. After that show ended its run, Reiner's first film feature was an adaptation of Joseph Stein's play Enter Laughing (1967), which in turn was based on Reiner's semi-autobiographical 1958 novel of the same name. Balancing writing, directing, producing, and acting, Reiner has worked on a wide range of films and television programs. Probably the best-known films of his early directing career were the cult comedy Where's Poppa? (1970), starring George Segal and Ruth Gordon, Oh, God! (1977) with George Burns and The Jerk (1979) with Steve Martin.

Reiner played a large role in the early career of Steve Martin, by directing and co-writing four films for the comedian: The Jerk in 1979, Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid in 1982, The Man with Two Brains in 1983, and All of Me in 1984. Reiner also appeared in both The Jerk and Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid.

In 1989, he directed Bert Rigby, You're a Fool. In 2000, Reiner was honored with the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. A year later, he played thief and con man Saul Bloom in Steven Soderbergh's remake of Ocean's Eleven and has reprised that role in its sequels, Ocean's Twelve and Ocean's Thirteen. In 2004 he voiced the lion Sarmoti in the animated TV series Father of the Pride.

Reiner is the author of several books, including his 2004 memoir, My Anecdotal Life: A Memoir, and novels such as 2006's NNNNN: A Novel. In American Film, Reiner expressed his philosophy on writing comedy: "You have to imagine yourself as not somebody very special but somebody very ordinary. If you imagine yourself as somebody really normal and if it makes you laugh, it's going to make everybody laugh. If you think of yourself as something very special, you'll end up a pedant and a bore. If you start thinking about what's funny, you won't be funny, actually. It's like walking. How do you walk? If you start thinking about it, you'll trip."

In May 2009, Reiner guest starred as a clinic patient on the season finale of the Fox series House. He also lent his voice to the character of Santa Claus in the NBC Christmas special Merry Madagascar in November 2009, and reprised his role as Santa in The Penguins of Madagascar holiday special "The All Nighter Before Christmas. In December 2009, Reiner guest-starred as a television prodcuer on the CBS sitcom Two and a Half Men. In June 2010, Reiner guest starred in TV Land's new series "Hot in Cleveland" as Elka Ostrovsky's date and reprised the role in July 2010. Reiner also made appearances on The Cleveland Show as Murray and wrote the story for the episode "Your Show of Shows", named after the program that started his career.

Reiner has the distinction of being the only person to appear on The Tonight Show with each of its five hosts.

Personal life[link]

Reiner in April 2011

On December 24, 1943, Reiner married singer Estelle Lebost. The two were married 64 years until her death in 2008. At the time of the marriage, he was 21 and she was 29. Estelle is probably best remembered for her line "I'll have what she's having" in the deli scene of their son Rob's 1989 film When Harry Met Sally.^[1] She died on October 25, 2008, at age 94.^[5]

Reiner is the father of actor-turned-director Rob Reiner (b. 1947), poet, playwright and author Sylvia Anne (Annie) Reiner (b. 1957), and painter,^[6] actor, and director Lucas Reiner (b. 1960).^[1][7]

Reiner, who is Jewish, has described himself as a Jewish atheist.^[3] He says, "I have a very different take on who God is. Man invented God because he needed him. God is us."^[8]

Bibliography[link]

• Enter Laughing (1958)
• 2000 Years With: Carl Reiner & Mel Brooks (with Mel Brooks, 1960)
• All Kinds of Love (1993)
• Continue Laughing (1995)
• How Paul Robeson Saved My Life (and Other Mostly Happy Stories) (1999)
• The 2000 Year-Old Man in the Year 2000: The Book (1999)
• My Anecdotal Life: A Memoir (2003)
• NNNNN: A Novel (2006)
• Tell Me Another Scary Story... But Not Too Scary! (with James Bennett) (2009)
• Just Desserts: A Novellelah (2009)
• Tell Me a Silly Story (with James Bennett) (2010)

As screenwriter[link]

• The Thrill of It All (1963)
• The Art of Love (1965)
• Enter Laughing (with Joseph Stein, 1967)
• The Comic (with Aaron Ruben, 1968)
• Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (with Steve Martin and George Gipe, 1982)
• The Man with Two Brains (with Steve Martin and George Gipe, 1983)
• Bert Rigby, You're a Fool (1989)

As director[link]

• Enter Laughing (1967)
• The Comic (1969)
• Where's Poppa? (1970)
• Oh, God! (1977)
• The One and Only (1978)
• The Jerk (1979)
• Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982)
• The Man with Two Brains (1983)
• All of Me (1984)
• Summer Rental (1985)
• Summer School (1987)
• Bert Rigby, You're a Fool (1989)
• Sibling Rivalry (1990)
• Fatal Instinct (1992)
• That Old Feeling (1997)

Plays[link]

• Something Different (1967)

Television[link]

• Your Show of Shows (1950-54)
• Caesar's Hour (1954-1957)
• Sid Caesar Invites You (1958)
• The Dinah Shore Chevy Show (1959-1960)
• The Comedy Spot (1960)
• The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961-66, also Creator)
• The Judy Garland Show (1963)
• The Sid Caesar, Imogene Coca, Carl Reiner, Howard Morris Special (1967)
• The New Dick Van Dyke Show (1971-1974)
• Lotsa Luck (1973) (also Creator)
• The Alan Brady Show (2003)
• The Dick Van Dyke Show Revisited (2004)
• The Bernie Mac Show (2001-2006)
• Two and a Half Men (2009-2010)- 3 Episodes
• Hot In Cleveland (2010-present)
• Parks and Recreation (2012)

Acting credits[link]

• Your Show of Shows (1950-1954) (TV)
• Caesar's Hour (1954-1957) (TV)
• The Sid Caesar Show (1958) (TV)
• The Gazebo (1959)
• It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963)
• The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming (1966)
• The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961-1966) (TV)
• The 2000 Year Old Man (1975)
• Good Heavens (1976) (TV)
• The End (1978)
• The Jerk (1979)
• Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982)
• The Spirit of '76 (1990)
• Mad About You (1995) (TV)
• King of the Hill (1997-2000) (TV)
• Ocean's Eleven (2001)
• Slums of Beverly Hills (1998)
• The Bernie Mac Show (2002) (TV)
• Ally McBeal (2002) (TV)
• Crossing Jordan (2002) (TV) - Episode 1x19 - Harry Macy
• Ocean's Twelve (2004)
• Father of the Pride (2004) (TV)
• Boston Legal (2005) (TV)
• Ocean's Thirteen (2007)
• House M.D. (2008) (TV)
• Two and a Half Men (2009) (TV)
• Merry Madagascar (2009) (TV)
• The Penguins of Madagascar (2010) (TV)
• Hot in Cleveland (2010) (TV)

Other[link]

• Carl Reiner: An American Film Institute Seminar on His Work, Microfilming Corporation of America, (1977)*
• Faerie Tale Theatre Pinocchio (1984) - Geppetto
• World War Z - Max Brooks (2007)

Awards[link]

Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6421 Hollywood Blvd.

• Emmy Award, 1957, Best supporting actor in a comedy series (Caesar's Hour)
• Emmy Award, 1958, Best supporting actor in a comedy series (Sid Caesar Invites You)
• Outstanding writing achievement in comedy, 1962, 1963, and 1964 (The Dick Van Dyke Show)
• Outstanding program achievement in entertainment, 1965 (The Dick Van Dyke Show)
• Outstanding writing achievement in a variety, 1967 (The Sid Caesar, Imogene Coca, Carl Reiner, Howard Morris Special)
• Grammy Award nomination, 1960, (2000 Years with Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks)
• Grammy Award (The 2000 Year Old Man in the Year 2000)
• Elected to Emmy Award Hall of Fame
• Grammy nomination for best spoken word album, 2001 (Letters from the Earth: Uncensored Writings from Mark Twain)

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, (2007).

External links[link]

Biography portal

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Carl Reiner

• Carl Reiner at the Internet Movie Database
• Carl Reiner at the Internet Broadway Database
• Carl Reiner at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Carl Reiner collected news and commentary at The New York Times
• See Carl Reiner's interview for the Archive of American Television
• "Remembering the Dick Van Dyke Show" (Carl Reiner)
• Profile of Carl Reiner at Jewish Times

Nanette Fabray
In 1939
Born	Ruby Bernadette Nanette Fabares (1920-10-27) October 27, 1920 (age 91) San Diego, California, U.S.
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1924–1994
Spouse	Dave Tebet (1947-1951) Ranald MacDougall (1957-1973)

Nanette Fabray (born October 27, 1920) is an American actress, comedienne, singer, dancer, and activist. She began her career performing in vaudeville as a child and became a musical theatre actress during the 1940s and 1950s, winning a Tony Award in 1949 for her performance in Love Life. In the mid-1950s, she served as Sid Caesar's comedic partner on Caesar's Hour, for which she won three Emmy Awards. From 1979-1984, she appeared as Grandma Katherine Romano on One Day at a Time.

Fabray overcame a significant hearing impairment and has been a long-time advocate for the rights of the deaf and hard of hearing. Her honors representing the handicapped include the President's Distinguished Service Award and the Eleanor Roosevelt Humanitarian Award.

Early life, education, and work as a child actor[link]

Fabray was born Ruby Bernadette Nanette Fabares in San Diego, California, to Raul Bernard Fabares, a train conductor, and Lily Agnes McGovern, a housewife. The family resided in Los Angeles and Fabray's mother was instrumental in getting her daughter involved in show business as a child. At a young age, she studied tap dancing with, among others, Bill “Bojangles” Robinson. She made her professional stage debut as "Miss New Years Eve 1923" at the Million Dollar Theater at the age of three. The following year, she made her first film appearance as an extra in the Our Gang short Cradle Robbers. She spent much of her childhood appearing in vaudeville productions as a dancer and singer. She appeared with stars such as Ben Turpin.

Fabray's parents divorced when she was nine, but continued living together for financial reasons. During the Great Depression, her mother turned their home into a boarding house, which Fabray and her siblings helped run. In her early teenage years, Fabray attended the Max Reinhardt School of the Theatre on a scholarship. She then attended Hollywood High School, where she graduated in 1939. She entered Los Angeles Junior College in the fall of 1939, but withdrew a few months later. She had always had difficulty in school due to an undiagnosed hearing impairment, which made learning difficult. She eventually was diagnosed with a hearing loss in her 20s after an acting teacher encouraged her to get her hearing tested. Fabray said of the experience, "It was a revelation to me. All these years I had thought I was stupid, but in reality I just had a hearing problem."

Career as a musical theatre actress[link]

At the age of 19, Fabray made her feature film debut as one of Bette Davis' ladies-in-waiting in The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (1939). She appeared in two additional motion pictures that year for Warner Brothers, The Monroe Doctrine and A Child Is Born, but failed to gain a long-term studio contract. She next appeared in the stage production Meet the People in Los Angeles in 1940, which then toured the United States in 1940-1941. In the show, she sang the opera aria "Caro nome" from Giuseppe Verdi's Rigoletto while tap dancing. During the show's New York run, Fabray was invited to perform the "Caro nome" number for a benefit at Madison Square Garden with Eleanor Roosevelt as the main speaker. Ed Sullivan was the Master of Ceremonies for the event and the famed host, reading a cue card, mispronounced her name as "Nanette Fa-bare-ass." After this embarrassing faux pas, the actress changed the spelling of her name from Fabares to Fabray.^[1]

Artur Rodziński, conductor of the New York Philharmonic, saw Fabray's performance in Meet the People and offered to sponsor operatic vocal training for her at the Juilliard School. She studied opera at Juilliard during the latter half of 1941 while performing in her first Broadway musical, Let's Face It!, with Danny Kaye and Eve Arden. She decided that she preferred musical theatre over opera and withdrew from the school after five months. She became a successful musical theatre actress in New York during the 1940s and early 1950s, starring in such productions as By Jupiter (1942), My Dear Public (1943), Jackpot (1944), Bloomer Girl (1946), High Button Shoes (1947), Arms and the Girl (1950), and Make a Wish (1951). In 1949, she won the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical for her portrayal of Susan Cooper in the Kurt Weill/Alan Jay Lerner musical Love Life. She received a Tony nomination for her role as Nell Henderson in 1963 for Mr. President 1963 after an eleven-year absence from the New York stage.^[1]. Fabray continued to tour in musicals for many years, appearing in such shows as Wonderful Town and No No Nanette.

Television and film[link]

In the mid-1940s, Fabray worked regularly for David Sarnoff and NBC on a variety of programs in the Los Angeles area. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, she made her first high-profile national television appearances performing on a number of variety programs such as The Ed Sullivan Show, Texaco Star Theater, and The Arthur Murray Party. She also appeared on Your Show of Shows as a guest star opposite Sid Caesar. She appeared as a regular on Caesar's Hour from 1954–1956, winning three Emmys. Fabray left the show after a misunderstanding when her business manager, unbeknown to her, made unreasonable demands for her third season contract. Fabray and Caesar did not reconcile until years later.

Fabray appeared as the mother of the main character on television series such as One Day at a Time, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and Coach, where she played mother to real-life niece Shelley Fabares. She also made appearances on The Carol Burnett Show, Burke's Law, Love, American Style, Maude, The Love Boat, What's My Line?, and Murder, She Wrote. Her brief, eponymously-titled 1961 comedy series was cancelled after 13 episodes. On the PBS program Pioneers of Television: Sitcoms, Mary Tyler Moore credited Fabray with inspiring her trademark comedic crying technique.

In 1953, Fabray played her most well-known screen role as a Betty Comden-like playwright in MGM's The Band Wagon with Fred Astaire and Jack Buchanan. The film featured Fabray, Astaire, and Buchanan performing the classic musical number "Triplets", which was included in That's Entertainment Part II. Additional film credits include The Subterraneans (1960), The Happy Ending (1969), Amy (1981), and Teresa's Tattoo (1994).

Fabray's most recent work was in 2007, when she appeared in The Damsel Dialogues, an original revue by composer Dick de Benedictus, with direction/choreography by Miriam Nelson. The show, which was performed at the Whitefire Theatre in Sherman Oaks, California, focused on women's' issues with life, love, loss, and the workplace.

Personal life[link]

Fabray's first husband, Dave Tebet, was a Vice-President of NBC. Her second husband was screenwriter Ranald MacDougall, who numbered Mildred Pierce and Cleopatra among his credits, and who served as President of the Writers Guild of America in the early 1970s. The couple was married from 1957 until his death in 1973. They had one child.

Fabray is a resident of Pacific Palisades, California.

In 2001, she wrote to advice columnist Dear Abby to decry the loud background music used on television programs.^[2]

Fabray is the aunt of singer/actress Shelley Fabares.^[3]

Hollywood Walk of Fame[link]

Nanette Fabray has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Partial filmography[link]

Film[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Nanette Fabray at the Internet Broadway Database
• Nanette Fabray at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Nanette Fabray at the Internet Movie Database

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (April 2009)

Andy Griffith
Andy Griffith receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Born	Andy Samuel Griffith (1926-06-01) June 1, 1926 (age 86) Mount Airy, North Carolina, United States
Nationality	American
Education	Mount Airy High School
Alma mater	University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Occupation	Actor, comedian, director, producer, singer (country, bluegrass & southern gospel), writer
Years active	1949–present
Notable work(s)	The Andy Griffith Show, Matlock
Political party	Democrat
Religion	Christian (Baptist/Moravian Church)
Spouse	Barbara Bray Edwards (m. 1949–72) (divorced) Solica Cassuto (m. 1975–81) (divorced) Cindi Knight (1983–present)

Andy Samuel Griffith (born June 1, 1926) is an American actor, director, producer, Grammy Award-winning Southern-gospel singer, and writer.^[1] He gained prominence in the starring role in director Elia Kazan's epic film, A Face in the Crowd (1957) before he became better known for his television roles, playing the lead characters in the 1960–68 situation comedy, The Andy Griffith Show, and in the 1986–95 legal drama, Matlock. Griffith was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by US President George W. Bush on November 9, 2005.

Early life and education[link]

Griffith was born in Mount Airy, North Carolina, the only child of Geneva (née Nunn) and Carl Lee Griffith.^[2] At a very young age, Griffith had to live with relatives until his parents could afford to get a home of their own. Without a crib or a bed, he slept in drawers for a few months. In 1929, when Griffith was three years old, his father took a job working as a carpenter and was finally able to purchase a home in Mount Airy's "blue-collar" southside.

Like his mother, Griffith grew up listening to music. His father instilled a sense of humor from old family stories. By the time he entered school he was well aware that he was from what many considered the "wrong side of the tracks". He was a shy student, but once he found a way to make his peers laugh, he began to come out of his shell and come into his own.

As a student at Mount Airy High School, Griffith cultivated an interest in the arts, and he participated in the school's drama program. A growing love of music, particularly swing, would change his life. Griffith was raised Baptist^[3] and looked up to Ed Mickey, a minister at Grace Moravian Church, who led the brass band and taught him to sing and play the trombone. Mickey nurtured Griffith's talent throughout high school until graduation in 1944. Griffith was delighted when he was offered a role in The Lost Colony, a play still performed today on Roanoke Island. He performed as a cast member of the play for several years, playing a variety of roles, until he finally landed the role of Sir Walter Raleigh, the namesake of North Carolina's capital.

He began college studying to be a Moravian preacher, but he changed his major to music and became a part of the school's Carolina Play Makers. He attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and graduated with a bachelor of music degree in 1949. At UNC he was president of the UNC Men's Glee Club and a member of the Alpha Rho Chapter of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, America's oldest fraternity for men in music.^{[citation needed]} He also played roles in several student operettas, including The Chimes of Normandy (1946), and Gilbert and Sullivan's The Gondoliers (1945), The Mikado (1948) and H.M.S. Pinafore (1949).^[4]

After graduation, he taught English for a few years at Goldsboro High School in Goldsboro, North Carolina, where he taught, among others, Carl Kasell.^[5] He also began to write.

Career[link]

From rising comedian to film star[link]

Griffith's early career was as a monologist, delivering long stories such as What it Was, Was Football, which is told from the point of view of a rural backwoodsman trying to figure out what was going on in a football game.^[6] Released as a single in 1953 on the Colonial label, the monologue was a hit for Griffith, reaching number nine on the charts in 1954.^[7]

Griffith starred in a one-hour teleplay version of No Time for Sergeants (March 1955)—a story about a country boy in the US Air Force—on The United States Steel Hour, a television anthology series. He expanded that role in a full-length theatrical version of the same name (October 1955) on Broadway in New York City, New York.^[8] His Broadway career also included the title role in the 1957 musical, Destry Rides Again, co-starring Delores Gray. The show, with a score by Harold Rome, ran for more than a year.

Griffith later reprised his role for the film version (1958) of No Time for Sergeants; the film also featured Don Knotts, as a corporal in charge of manual-dexterity tests, marking the beginning of a life-long association between Griffith and Knotts. No Time for Sergeants is considered the direct inspiration for the later television situation comedy Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.^[9]

He also portrayed a US Coast Guard sailor in the feature film Onionhead (1958); it was neither a critical nor a commercial success.

[edit] Dramatic role in A Face in the Crowd (1957)

In 1957 Griffith made his film début, starring in the film A Face in the Crowd. Although he plays a "country boy", this country boy is manipulative and power-hungry, a drifter who becomes a television host and uses his show as a gateway to political power. Co-starring Patricia Neal, Walter Matthau, Tony Franciosa, and Lee Remick (in her film début as well), this now-classic film, directed by Elia Kazan, showcases Griffith's powerful talents. Written by Budd Schulberg, and partly based on the on-stage phoniness of Arthur Godfrey, the film demonstrated, quite early on, the power that television can have upon the masses. This prescient film was seldom run on television until the 1990s.^{[citation needed]}

A 2005 DVD reissue of A Face in the Crowd includes a mini-documentary on the film, with comments from Schulberg and surviving cast members Griffith, Franciosa, and Neal. In his interview, Griffith, revered for his wholesome image for decades, reveals a more complex side of himself. He recalls Kazan prepping him to shoot his first scene with Remick's teenaged baton twirler, who captivates Griffith's character on a trip to Arkansas. Griffith also expresses his belief that the film was far more popular and respected in more recent decades than it was when originally released.

Television roles[link]

Early television roles[link]

Publicity photo of Griffith for his No Time for Sergeants television appearance.

Griffith's first appearance on television had been in 1955 in the one-hour teleplay of No Time for Sergeants on The United States Steel Hour. That was the first of two appearances on that series.

In 1960, Griffith appeared as a county sheriff (who was also a justice of the peace and the editor of the local newspaper) in an episode of Make Room for Daddy, starring Danny Thomas. This episode, in which Thomas' character is stopped for speeding in a little town, served as a backdoor pilot for The Andy Griffith Show. Both shows were produced by Sheldon Leonard.

[edit] The Andy Griffith Show (1960–1968)

Beginning in 1960, Griffith starred as Sheriff Andy Taylor in The Andy Griffith Show for the CBS television network. The show took place in the fictional town of Mayberry, North Carolina, where Taylor, a widower, was the sheriff and town sage. The show was filmed at Desilu Studios, with exteriors filmed at Forty Acres in Culver City, CA.

From 1960 to 1965, the show co-starred character actor and comedian—and Griffith's longtime friend—Don Knotts in the role of Deputy Barney Fife, Taylor's best friend and partner. He was also Taylor's cousin in the show. In the series première episode, in a conversation between the two, Fife calls Taylor "Cousin Andy", and Taylor calls Fife "Cousin Barney". The show also starred child actor Ron Howard (then known as Ronny Howard), who played Taylor's only child, Opie Taylor.

Andy lends a hand when Barney gets his gun stuck on his finger.

It was an immediate hit. Although Griffith never received a writing credit for the show, he worked on the development of every script. While Knotts was frequently lauded and won multiple Emmy Awards for his comedic performances (as did Frances Bavier in 1967), Griffith was never nominated for an Emmy Award during the show's run.

In 1967, Griffith was under contract with CBS to do one more season of the show. However, he decided to quit the show to pursue a movie career and other projects. The series continued as Mayberry R.F.D., with Ken Berry starring as a widower farmer and many of the regular characters recurring, some regularly and some as guest appearances. Griffith served as executive producer (according to Griffith, he came in once a week to review the week's scripts and give input) and guest starred in five episodes (the pilot episode involved his marriage to Helen Crump).^[10] He made final appearances as Taylor in the 1986 reunion television film, Return to Mayberry, and in two reunion specials in 1993 and 2003.

[edit] Matlock (1986–1995)

After leaving his still-popular show in 1968, and starting his own production company (Andy Griffith Enterprises) in 1972, Griffith starred in less-successful television series such as Headmaster (1970), The New Andy Griffith Show (1971), Adams of Eagle Lake (1975) Salvage 1 (1979), and The Yeagers (1980).

After spending time in rehabilitation for leg paralysis from Guillain–Barré syndrome in 1986, Griffith returned to television as the title character, Ben Matlock, in the legal drama Matlock (1986–1995) on NBC and ABC. Matlock was a country lawyer in Atlanta, Georgia, who was known for his Southern drawl and for always winning his cases. Matlock also starred unfamiliar actors (both of whom were childhood fans of Andy Griffith) Nancy Stafford as Michelle Thomas (1987–1992) and Clarence Gilyard Jr. as Conrad McMasters (1989–1993). By the end of its first season it was a ratings powerhouse on Tuesday nights. Although the show was nominated for four Emmy Awards, Griffith once again was never nominated. He did, however, win a People's Choice Award in 1987 for his work as Matlock.

During the series' sixth season, he served as unofficial director, executive producer and writer of the show.

This show is mentioned on TV's longest animated show The Simpsons and is noted as Grandpa Simpson's favorite show as well as Marge Simpson's mother Jacqueline Bouvier's as well.

Other television appearances[link]

Griffith has also made other character appearances through the years on Playhouse 90, Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C., The Mod Squad, Hawaii Five-O, The Doris Day Show, Here's Lucy, The Bionic Woman, Fantasy Island, among many others. He also reprised his role as Ben Matlock on Diagnosis: Murder in 1997, and his most recent guest-starring role was in 2001 in an episode of Dawson's Creek.

Films (including television films)[link]

For most of the 1970s, Griffith starred or appeared in many television films including The Strangers In 7A (1972), Go Ask Alice (1973), Winter Kill (1974), and Pray for the Wildcats (1974), which marked his first villainous role. Griffith appeared again as a villain in Savages (1974), a television film based on the novel Deathwatch (1972) by Robb White. Griffith received his only Primetime Emmy Award nomination as Outstanding Supporting Actor – Miniseries or a Movie for his role as the father of a murder victim in the television film Murder In Texas (1981) and won further acclaim for his role as a homicidal villain in the television film Murder in Coweta County (1983), co-starring music legend Johnny Cash as the sheriff. He also proved to be a good character actor and appeared in several television mini-series, including the television version of From Here to Eternity (1979), Roots: The Next Generations (1979), Centennial (1978), and the Watergate scandal-inspired Washington: Behind Closed Doors (1977), playing a former president loosely based on Lyndon B. Johnson.

Most of the TV movies Griffith starred in were also attempts to launch a new series. 1974's Winter Kill launched the short lived Adams of Eagle Lake which was canceled after only two episodes in 1975. A year later, he starred as a New York City attorney for the DA's office in Street Killing which also failed to launch a new series. Two television films for NBC in 1977, The Girl in The Empty Grave and Deadly Game, were attempts for Griffith to launch a new series featuring him as Police Chief Abel Marsh, a more hard-edged version of Andy Taylor; despite strong ratings for both films, both were unsuccessful.

While appearing in television films and guest roles on television series over the next 10 years, Griffith also appeared in two feature films, both of which flopped at the box office. He co-starred with Jeff Bridges as a crusty old 1930s western actor in the comedy Hearts of the West (1975), and he appeared alongside Tom Berenger as a gay villainous colonel and cattle baron in the western comedy spoof Rustlers' Rhapsody (1985).

He also appeared as an attorney in the NBC mini-series Fatal Vision in 1984, which is considered a precursor to his role in Matlock.

Griffith stunned many unfamiliar with his A Face in the Crowd work in the television film Crime of Innocence (1985), where he portrayed a callous judge who routinely sentenced juveniles to hard prison time. He further stunned audiences with his role as a dangerous and mysterious grandfather in 1995's Gramps, co-starring the late John Ritter. He also appeared as a comical villain in the spy movie spoof Spy Hard (1996) starring Leslie Nielsen. In the television film A Holiday Romance (1999), Griffith played the role of "Jake Peterson." In the film Daddy and Them (2001), Griffith portrayed a patriarch of a dysfunctional southern family.

In the feature film Waitress (2007), Griffith played a crusty diner owner who takes a shine to Keri Russell's character. His latest appearance was the leading role in the romantic comedy, independent film Play The Game (2009) as a lonely, widowed grandfather re-entering the dating world after a 60-year hiatus. The cast of Play The Game also included Rance Howard, Ron Howard's real-life father, who made appearances in various supporting roles on The Andy Griffith Show, and Clint Howard, Ron's younger brother, who had the recurring role of Leon (the kid offering the ice cream cone or peanut butter sandwich) on TAGS.

Singing and recording career[link]

Griffith sang as part of some of his acting roles, most notably in A Face In The Crowd and in many episodes of both The Andy Griffith Show and Matlock. In addition to his recordings of comic monologues in the 1950s, he made an album of upbeat country and gospel tunes during the run of The Andy Griffith Show, which included a version of the show's theme sung by Griffith under the title "The Fishin' Hole". In recent years, he has recorded successful albums of classic Christian hymns for Sparrow Records. His most successful was the 1996 release I Love to Tell the Story: 25 Timeless Hymns, which was certified platinum by the RIAA.^[11]

Griffith appeared in country singer Brad Paisley's music video "Waitin' on a Woman" (2008).

Name dispute[link]

William Harold Fenrick of Platteville, Wisconsin, legally changed his name to Andrew Jackson Griffith and ran unsuccessfully for sheriff of Grant County in November 2006. Subsequently, actor Griffith filed a lawsuit against Griffith/Fenrick, asserting that he violated trademark, copyright, and privacy laws by changing his name for the "sole purpose of taking advantage of Griffith's notoriety in an attempt to gain votes". On May 4, 2007, US District Court Judge John C. Shabaz ruled that Griffith/Fenrick did not violate federal trademark law because he did not use the Griffith name in a commercial transaction but instead strove "to seek elective office, fundamental First Amendment protected speech."^[12]

Associations[link]

R.G. Armstrong[link]

The longest association Griffith has had began in 1949 with a then-unknown actor, R.G. Armstrong. They met when Armstrong was one of Griffith's and his first wife's students at UNC, where Armstrong majored in drama. After graduating from college, Armstrong went on to become a versatile character actor while attending The Actors Studio in New York City.

In the 1960s, they were reunited in an episode of The Andy Griffith Show, with Armstrong playing a farmer who was the father of a tomboy. In the 1980s, Armstrong made a guest appearance in a two-part episode of Matlock, which was filmed in Wilmington, North Carolina, playing the role of a sheriff who introduces Matlock to a young, hotshot private investigator. Griffith and Armstrong keep in contact.

Don Knotts[link]

Griffith's relationship with Knotts began in 1955, when they co-starred in the Broadway play No Time for Sergeants. Several years later, Knotts had a regular role on The Andy Griffith Show for five seasons. Knotts left the series in 1965 but periodically returned for guest appearances. He appeared in the pilot for Griffith's subsequent short-lived series, The New Andy Griffith Show, and he had a recurring role on Matlock, from 1988 to 1992.

They kept in contact until Knotts' death in early 2006. Griffith traveled from his Manteo, North Carolina home to Los Angeles, California, to visit a terminally ill Knotts in the hospital just before Knotts died from complications of lung cancer.^[13]

Ron Howard[link]

Griffith's friendship with Howard began in 1960, when they guest-starred in the episode of Make Room For Daddy that led to the formation of The Andy Griffith Show that same year. For eight seasons they shared a unique father-son relationship on the set. They guest-starred together in its spin-off series, Mayberry R.F.D., in an episode where Griffith's character married his long-time girlfriend. They also appeared in the episode Opie's Ill-Gotten Gain, in which Howard's character, Opie, runs away from home and attempts to enlist in the US Marines. Howard and Griffith starred together in most of "The Andy Griffith Show" episodes. They costarred in the television special Return to Mayberry (1986), in which the now-adult Opie is about to become a father, and they later appeared together in CBS reunion specials in 1993 and 2003.

Griffith made a surprise appearance as the ghost of Andy Taylor when Howard hosted Saturday Night Live in 1982. Howard did not make any cameo appearances on Matlock, but his mother, Jean Speegle Howard, had a small role in one episode. Howard attended the People's Choice Awards in 1987, where Griffith was honored.

Howard and Griffith keep in contact sharing news about family and personal activities. Howard and his family attended Waitress (2007), which they reportedly enjoyed.^{[citation needed]} To this day, Griffith still calls Howard by his childhood nickname, Ronny.

In October 2008, Griffith and Howard briefly reprised their Mayberry roles in an online video Ron Howard’s Call to Action. It was posted to comedy video website Funny or Die. The video encouraged people to vote and endorsed Democratic candidates Barack Obama and Joe Biden.^[14]

Personal life[link]

Marriage and family[link]

Griffith and Barbara Bray Edwards were married on August 22, 1949, and they adopted a son, Andrew Samuel Griffith Jr. (born in 1957 and known as Sam Griffith), a real-estate developer, and a daughter, Dixie Nan. They were divorced in 1972. Sam died in 1996 after years of alcoholism.^[15]

He and Cindi Knight were married on April 12, 1983; they had met when he was filming Murder in Coweta County.

Political activities[link]

In addition to his online video with Howard in 2008, in politics Griffith has favored Democrats and recorded television commercials endorsing North Carolina Governors Mike Easley^[16] and Bev Perdue.^[17] He spoke at the inauguration ceremonies of both.^[18][19] In 1984, he declined an offer by Democratic party officials to run against Jesse Helms, a US Senator from North Carolina.^{[citation needed]}

In July 2010, he also starred in ads about Medicare.^[20]

Health[link]

Griffith's first serious health problem was in April 1983, when he was diagnosed with Guillain-Barré syndrome^[21][22] and could not walk for seven months because of paralysis from the knees down.

On May 9, 2000, he underwent quadruple heart-bypass surgery at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital in Norfolk, Virginia.^[23] After a fall, Griffith underwent hip surgery on September 5, 2007, at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.^[24]

Albums[link]

Filmography[link]

Features[link]

Short subjects[link]

Television work[link]

Honors[link]

Andy Griffith and Julie Adams in 1962

Mount Airy annually celebrates Griffith and his eponymous television series with "Mayberry Days", named after the fictional community of Mayberry in The Andy Griffith Show.^[26]

A statue of the Mayberry characters, Andy and Opie, was constructed in Pullen Park in Raleigh, North Carolina, and at the Andy Griffith Playhouse in Mount Airy.

C.F. Martin & Company, guitar manufacturers, offers an Andy Griffith signature model guitar. Limited edition in 2004 of the D-18 Model with 311 units total production. Patterned after Andy's own 1956 D-18.

Griffith received a Grammy Award for Best Southern, Country or Bluegrass Gospel Album for I Love to Tell the Story — 25 Timeless Hymns in 1997.

In 1999 Griffith was inducted into the Country Gospel Music Hall of Fame with fellow artists Lulu Roman, Barbara Mandrell, David L. Cook, Gary S. Paxton, Jimmy Snow, Loretta Lynn, and Jody Miller.^[27]

In October 2002, an 11-mile (18 km) stretch of US Highway 52 that passes through Mount Airy was dedicated as the Andy Griffith Parkway.

He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Bush on November 9, 2005.^[28]

A few weeks earlier, he had helped preside over the reopening of UNC's Memorial Hall and donated a substantial amount of memorabilia from his career to the university.

In 2007, he was inducted into the Christian Music Hall of Fame and Museum.^[29]

References[link]