The character of Marshal Dillon cast one of the biggest shadows on TV. There was no way Jim Arness was going to get out from under him after playing him for two decades.
Andy Griffith really lucked out with "Matlock" after several, post-"Andy Griffith Show" misses, but it could be argued that Ben Matlock was really just an older, crankier version of Sheriff Andy Taylor. (Same went for Dick Van Dyke, who played Dr. Mark Sloan on "Diagnosis: Murder" more-or-less as Rob Petrie with a medical license).
Similarly, you might argue that Carroll O'Connor's two characters, Archie Bunker and Chief Bill Gillespie, were two sides of the same coin, with the only difference being that "In the Heat of the Night" soft-pedaled Gillespie's bigotry in the early seasons until his interracial relationship with Harriet DeLong eliminated that entirely.
By
Khan ·
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