R.I.P. George Kennedy, 91

[applcin]

I always liked him. Whatever he was in, he gave a solid performance. And he seemed to be a genuinely nice guy. His wife died last year.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/george-kennedy-dead-cool-hand-721400

Found this little bit in an interview and it's funny to picture:
Melissa Parker (Smashing Interviews Magazine): Thank goodness for that. You’ve had quite a career in television also, from Perry Mason to Dr. Kildare to The Love Boat to Dallas. Were you friends with Raymond Burr?
George Kennedy: Yes. Raymond Burr was bigger than Mt. Vesuvius. I’ve got to tell you a story I’ve never told anybody. Raymond and I were big men. We’re talking 6’4”, and both of us weighed more than a ton and a half each. For that reason, as well as others, we liked each other. If you can picture this, we’d talk about being big guys and we would giggle.
Now, here was 600 pounds of guys sitting between shots in a couple of chairs and almost breaking them because we’re giggling at jokes. Over all of Raymond’s movies and TV shows, I remember him as a guy who’d giggle with me and didn’t care. I thought he was a wonderful actor.


And a nice little nugget from a few years ago from Sara Karloff, daughter of Boris:
When she was asked who her father’s favorite actors were, Sara Karloff said the only performer whose craft he’d ever specifically mentioned to her was veteran American actor George Kennedy, who’s been in more 200 movies and TV shows and who won an Oscar for his performance in Cool Hand Luke.
She said that she met Kennedy for the first time last year and told him that he was her father’s favorite actor.
“It brought tears to his eyes,” she said.
Kennedy told her that he’d once seen Karloff coming out of a stage door on Broadway and had wanted to talk to him, but didn’t “have the nerve.”
“You know, I’ve always regretted not doing that,” the tough guy actor told her.
“I wish you had, it would have meant so much to my father,” she told Kennedy.
“And the tears got bigger,” she said.

[quartermainefan]

How sad.   He was an ever present fixture in the 1970s in various disaster films, then came the Naked Gun films.  I guess his career wound down with Dallas, but he was a solid actor who won an oscar.  I guess Airport changed the trajectory of his career.

[All My Shadows]

RIP to a fantastic actor. To this day, CHL remains an all-time favorite of mine. I grew up watching it on Saturday afternoons with my dad and grandma.