Richard Basehart

Birthday

1914-08-13

Place of Birth

Zanesville, Ohio, USA

Biography

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia John Richard Basehart (August 31, 1914 – September 17, 1984) was an American actor. He starred in the 1960s television science fiction drama Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, in the role of Admiral Harriman Nelson. One of his most notable film roles was the acrobat known as "the Fool" in the acclaimed Italian film La strada directed by Federico Fellini. He also appeared as the killer in the film noir classic He Walked by Night (1948), as a psychotic member of the Hatfield clan in Roseanna McCoy (1949), as Ishmael in Moby Dick (1956), and in the drama Decision Before Dawn (1951). He was married to Italian Academy Award-nominated actress Valentina Cortese, with whom he had one son before their divorce in 1960. Cortese and Basehart also costarred in Robert Wise's The House on Telegraph Hill (1951). Basehart was also noted for his deep, distinctive voice and was prolific as a narrator of many television and movie projects ranging from features to documentaries. In 1980, Basehart narrated the mini-series written by Peter Arnett called Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day War that covered Vietnam and its battles from the Japanese surrender on September 2, 1945 to the final American embassy evacuation on April 30, 1975. He appeared in the pilot episode of the television series Knight Rider as billionaire Wilton Knight. He is the narrator at the beginning of the show's credits. In 1971, Basehart played "Captain Sligo", a comical Irishman with a pet buffalo who negotiates a flawed but legal cattle purchase and unconventionally courts a widow with two children, played by Salome Jens, in CBS's western series, Gunsmoke, with James Arness. Basehart appeared in an episode of The Twilight Zone, Hawaii Five-O, and as Hannibal Applewood, an abusive schoolteacher in Little House on the Prairie in 1976. In 1972, he appeared in the Columbo episode Dagger of the Mind in which he and Honor Blackman played a husband-and-wife theatrical team who were loose parodies of Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh. In the feature realm, he played a supporting role as a doctor in Rage (1972), a theatrical feature starring and directed by George C. Scott. He made a few TV movies including Sole Survivor (1970) and The Birdmen (1971). Both were based on true stories during World War II. He died at age 70 following a series of strokes. One month before his death, Basehart was an announcer for the closing ceremonies of the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Description above from the Wikipedia article Richard Basehart, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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All Movies List

The Rebels

The Rebels

1979 6.4
The Rebels

as Duke of Kentland

1979
Flood!

Flood!

1977 5.2
Flood!

as John Cutler

1977
Maneater

Maneater

1973 6.1
Maneater

as Carl Brenner

1973
Rage

Rage

1972 6.3
Rage

as Dr. Roy Caldwell

1972
Sole Survivor

Sole Survivor

1970 7.3
Sole Survivor

as Brig. Gen. Russell Hamner

1970
The Satan Bug

The Satan Bug

1965 6.1
The Satan Bug

as Dr. Gregor Hoffman

1965
Hitler

Hitler

1962 5.7
Hitler

as Adolf Hitler

1962
Time Limit

Time Limit

1957 7.3
Time Limit

as Maj. Harry Cargill

1957
La Strada

La Strada

1956 8
La Strada

as Il 'Matto'

1956
Finger of Guilt

Finger of Guilt

1956 6.2
Finger of Guilt

as Reginald 'Reggie' Wilson

1956
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