33 Facts About George Kennedy

1.

George Kennedy played "Dragline" opposite Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke, winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for the role and being nominated for the corresponding Golden Globe.

2.

George Kennedy received a second Golden Globe nomination for portraying Joe Patroni in Airport.

3.

George Kennedy played Police Captain Ed Hocken in the Naked Gun series of comedy films, and corrupt oil tycoon Carter McKay on the original Dallas television series.

4.

George Kennedy was born on February 18,1925, in New York City, into a show business family.

5.

George Kennedy was raised by his mother, Helen A, a ballet dancer.

6.

George Kennedy's maternal grandfather was a German immigrant; his other ancestry was Irish and English.

7.

George Kennedy made his stage debut at age two in a touring company of Bringing Up Father, and by seven was a New York City radio DJ.

8.

George Kennedy graduated in 1943 from Chaminade High School in Mineola, Long Island, New York.

9.

George Kennedy enlisted in the United States Army during World War II in 1943.

10.

George Kennedy served 16 years, reaching the rank of captain.

11.

George Kennedy re-enlisted after the war and was discharged in the late 1950s due to a back injury.

12.

George Kennedy's first notable screen role was a military policeman on the TV sitcom The Phil Silvers Show, where he served as a technical adviser to ensure accuracy for the show's military base setting.

13.

George Kennedy later described the Silvers show as "a great training ground".

14.

George Kennedy appeared in several Hollywood movies, including as a sadistic jail guard in the Kirk Douglas modern western Lonely Are the Brave, a ruthless criminal in the Cary Grant suspense film Charade, and in a Joan Crawford thriller, Strait-Jacket.

15.

George Kennedy appeared with Gregory Peck in the mystery Mirage, with a large cast led by James Stewart in the plane-crash adventure The Flight of the Phoenix, with John Wayne in the war film In Harm's Way, and with Wayne and Dean Martin in the western The Sons of Katie Elder.

16.

George Kennedy played the character "Blodgett" in a 1966 episode "Return to Lawrence" of the ABC Western series The Legend of Jesse James.

17.

George Kennedy reprised this role in Airport 1975, Airport '77 and The Concorde.

18.

The role went to Lloyd Bridges, because George Kennedy "couldn't kill off his Airport cash-cow", Jerry Zucker said in 2010.

19.

George Kennedy co-starred with Clint Eastwood in two films, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot and The Eiger Sanction, and with ensemble casts in the disaster film Earthquake and the Agatha Christie mystery Death on the Nile.

20.

George Kennedy starred in two television series: Sarge, which aired from 1971 to 1972 on NBC, and The Blue Knight, a CBS series that ran for 24 episodes from 1975 to 1976.

21.

George Kennedy starred in two Japanese productions, Junya Sato's Proof of the Man in 1977 and Kinji Fukasaku's Virus in 1980.

22.

In 1984, George Kennedy starred opposite Bo Derek in the box-office bomb Bolero.

23.

In 1990, George Kennedy appeared in the Korean film Mayumi directed by Shin Sang-ok who was best known for having been kidnapped with actress and wife Choi Eun-hee by North Korean leader Kim Jong-il.

24.

On television, George Kennedy starred as Carter McKay in the CBS prime time serial Dallas, appearing from 1988 to 1991.

25.

George Kennedy then made several independent films, before making a 2003 comeback to television in the soap opera The Young and the Restless, playing the character Albert Miller, the biological father to legendary character Victor Newman.

26.

George Kennedy made his final film appearance in The Gambler as Ed, the dying grandfather of Mark Wahlberg's Jim Bennett.

27.

George Kennedy's role lasts for less than two minutes during the film's opening scene, wherein Ed bequeaths the responsibilities of patriarch to a heartbroken Jim.

28.

In 1959, George Kennedy married Norma Wurman, known as Revel Wurman.

29.

That same year, George Kennedy married Joan McCarthy, daughter of John Castagna and former wife of William James McCarthy.

30.

George Kennedy was friends with James Stewart, and provided the voiceover in a Turner Classic Movies mini-tribute to Stewart.

31.

George Kennedy was an aviator who enjoyed flying and owned a Cessna 210 and Beechcraft Bonanza.

32.

George Kennedy resided in Eagle, Idaho, at the time of his death.

33.

George Kennedy died on the morning of February 28,2016, of a heart ailment at an assisted living facility in Middleton, Idaho, 10 days after his 91st birthday.