There were solid performances by numerous B-movie actors but they never became major film stars. The new medium of television offered a career shift and kept them busy. Some became a household face if not a name.
PAUL RICHARDS (1924-1974)
Richards may be best known to television viewers for his
roles as a criminal or using his distinctive voice and monotone
delivery as a psychologically disturbed individual. The versatile actor may be most familiar in the saddle, however. Throughout the
Fifties and Sixties, he appeared on nearly every Western series in the
likes of The Rifleman, Have Gun–Will Travel, Bonanza, and The
Virginian. Richards performed four times on Gunsmoke. In
the very first episode, he is cast as a near-sighted, unemotional
gunfighter who outdraws Matt Dillon, nearly ending the series.
His transition to television seemed to be an easy one give his dynamic and realistic performances on the small screen. Between three or four stealthy film roles, he had a minor role as a prisoner in the high-profile film, Demetrius and the Gladiators. He played an unsuccessful mugger to Ralph Meeker's character in Kiss Me Deadly, then a competing oil industry driller framed by Gene Barry in, The Houston Story. Beneath the Planet of The Apes (1970) is probably the worst of the original franchise but Richards, as the skinless mutant leader, makes a creepy impression. Only his voice can be identified.
It
was not all Westerns, of course. He starred as Dr. McKinley Thompson
in the medical drama Breaking Point (1963) then an appearance
on The Fugitive. He later appeared as a villainous lawyer in a
1968 episode of Hawaii Five-O. The early Seventies provided
gigs on Burke's Law, I Spy, Mannix, Banacek, McMillan, and Wife,
with three appearances on The Mod Squad.
Notes: A native of Hollywood, Richards earned a psychology degree at the University of California, Los Angeles, and a master's degree in drama, also from UCLA. He gained additional acting experience at the Theatre Wing in New York. For several years, Richards served as the commercial pitchman for General Motors' Pontiac Division. He was also the spokesman for Braniff Airways. In 1967 he was the narrator for a documentary on the building of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis called, Monument to the Dream. American Express hired him in the early 1970s as their commercial spokesman. Richard's single twenty-one-year marriage ended with his death in 1974.
My TV TRANSITION series has moved to Thursdays. Check out these earlier Monday posts from the previous site:
No comments:
Post a Comment