Ken Curtis , July 2, 1916 - April 28, 1991) is an American singer and actor famous for his role as Festus Haggen in running the Western CBS television series < i> Gunsmoke . Though he appeared in Gunsmoke before, in other roles, he first played a role in the icon in season 8 episode 13, "Us Haggens". His next appearance is Season 9, episode 2 as Kyle Kelly, in "Lover Boy" as a charming traveler who tells of a young wife of an old rancher.
Video Ken Curtis
Biography
Initial years
Born in Lamar, Prowers County, southeastern Colorado, Curtis spent his first ten years on a farm at Muddy Creek east of Bent County. In 1926, the family moved Las Animas, county seat Bent County, so his father, Dan Sullivan Gates, could run for sheriff. The campaign was successful, and Gates served from 1927 to 1931 as sheriff of Bent County. The family lives under the jail, because the prison is all over the second floor and his mother, Nellie Sneed Gates, is cooked for the prisoners. This prison is located for the purpose of historical preservation on the Bent House Court building at Las Animas.
Curtis is a quarterback of his Bent County High School football team and plays clarinet in a school band. He graduated in 1935. During World War II, Curtis served in the United States Army from 1943 to 1945.
He studied at Colorado College to study medicine, but left after a short time to pursue his music career.
Career
Curtis was a singer before moving on to acting, and merged his two careers as soon as he entered the film. Curtis joined the band Tommy Dorsey in 1941, and succeeded Frank Sinatra as vocalist until Dick Haymes replaced Sinatra in 1942. Curtis may only act as an insurance against Sinatra's possible defection, and Dorsey suggested that Gates change his name to Ken Curtis. Curtis later joined Shep Fields and His New Music, an all-reed band that was shared with brass parts.
Columbia Pictures signed Curtis for a contract in 1945. He starred in a series of Western music with The Hoosier Hot Shots, playing singing romances. Curtis met his first wife, Lorraine Page, at Universal Studios, and they married in 1943. In 1948, Curtis was a singer and host of the long-running country music radio program WWVA Jamboree.
Ken Curtis joined Sons of the Pioneers as a vocalist from 1949 to 1952. Big hits with the group included "Room Full of Roses" and "(Ghost) Riders in the Sky".
Through her second marriage, Curtis is the son-in-law of director John Ford. Curtis teamed up with Ford and John Wayne in The Rio Grande, The Quiet Man, The Wings of Eagles
Curtis guest starred five times in the Western television series Having Gun Will Travel with Richard Boone. In 1959, he appeared as a beehive of Phil Jakes on the four seasons episode of "Gunsmoke", "Jayhawkers". He is also guest guest as a circus performer Tim Durant on the episode of Perry Mason, the "Claudy Clown Case", which originally aired on November 5, 1960. Later, he appeared on Ripcord , the first syndicated action/adventure event about a company providing skydiving services, along with Larry Pennell. The series runs from 1961 to 1963 with a total of 76 half-hour episodes. Curtis plays the role of James (Jim) Buckley and Pennell is his young disciple Theodore (Ted) McKeever. This television program helps generate interest in the sport of skydiving.
In 1964, Curtis appeared as muleskinner Graydon in the episode "Graydon's Charge" from the syndicated Western television series, Death Valley Days, as well as guest stars of Denver Pyle and Cathy Lewis.
Gunsmoke
Curtis remains renowned for his role as Festus, an ingenious, ill-equipped, and illiterate representative at Gunsmoke. While Marshal Matt Dillon has a total of five deputies for two decades, Festus holds the longest role (11 years), in 304 episodes. Festus is patterned after "Cedar Jack" (Frederick Munden), a man from Curtis' Las Animas childhood. Cedar Jack, who lives 15 miles south of the city, earns a living cutting a cedar wood fence. Curtis watched over and over again that Jack had come to Las Animas, where he often ended up drunk and in Curtis's dungeon. Festus 'character is known, in part, for the rustic, pointy, rustic accent that Curtis developed for the role, but that does not reflect Curtis' real voice.
In addition to being involved in the personal performances that most television stars have to promote their programs, Curtis also travels around the country with Western-themed stage shows at fairs, rodeos and other places when Gunsmoke does not in production. , and even for a few years after the show was canceled. Curtis also campaigned for Ronald Reagan in 1976, during the efforts of the future President to secure a Republican nomination from Gerald Ford incumbent.
In two episodes of Gunsmoke , Carroll O'Connor is the guest star; Years later, Curtis became a guest star as a police detective who had retired on NBC O'Connor's In Heat of the Night program. He voiced the Nutsy vultures in the 1973 Disney animated film Robin Hood. A decade later, he returned to television in the short-lived Western series The Yellow Rose , where he performed most of his scenes with Noah Beery, Jr..
Recent years
In 1981, Curtis was inducted into the Western Performing Hall of Fame at National Cowboy & amp; Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
Curtis's last acting role is as an old cattle rancher "Seaborn Tay" in Conagher television production (1991), by western writer Louis L'Amour. Sam Elliott starred in the lead role, and Curtis' Gunsmoke co-star Buck Taylor (Newly O'Brien) plays the bad guy in the same movie. Buck Taylor's father, Dub Taylor, has a small role in it. He joined the Gunsmoke cast in 1967, replacing his previous representative, Thaddeus "Thad" Greenwood, played by Roger Ewing.
Curtis married Torrie Connelly in 1966. They married until his death in 1991 and he has two stepchildren.
The Ken Curtis statue as Festus can be found at 430 Pollasky Avenue in Clovis, California, in Fresno County in front of Credit Union Employee Education. In his last years, Curtis lived in Clovis.
Curtis is a Republican.
Maps Ken Curtis
Death
Curtis died on April 28, 1991, in his sleep from a heart attack in Fresno, California. He was cremated, and his ashes scattered on the flat plains of Colorado.
Selected filmography
Television
- Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp (1957) - episode - Warpath - Major Hendericks (unverified)
- Got Gun Will Travel (1959-1960) - Monk
- Wagon Train (1960) - episode - The Horace Best Story - Pappy Lightfoot
- Wagon Train (1960) - episode - The Story of Colter Craven - Kyle Cleatus
- Perry Mason (1960) - Durant Team
- Sea Hunt (1961) - episode - The Octopus Story - Professor Dean Austin, Season 4, Episode 20
- Ripcord (1961-1963) - Skydiver James (Jim) Buckley
- The Aquanauts (1961) - two episodes - Horton/butler
- Gunsmoke (1962-1975) - Festus
- Death Valley Days (1964) - Graydon's Charge - Graydon
- The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams (1978) - episode - Once Upon a Starry Night - Uncle Ned
- Vega $ (1979) - Dennison Digger
- How West Was Won (1979) - Orville Gant Sheriff
- The Yellow Rose (1983-1984) - Hoyt Coryell
- Airwolf (1986) - Cecil Carnes Sr.
- In Heat of the Night (1990) - Tom McCaul
Conagher (1991) - Seaborn Tay
References
External links
- Ken Curtis at Discover the Mausoleum
- Ken Curtis on IMDb
- Michael Breid shares memories of being part of Ken Curtis's backup band for his stage performances during the 1970s
- Chuck Anderson (November 22, 2007). "Ken Curtis". The Old Corral . Retrieved December 30, 2008 .
- Teresa Murray (August 10, 2008). "Ken Curtis Biography". Evil Twin . Retrieved December 30, 2008 .
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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