(Los Angeles) Bob Newhart, the deadpan accountant turned comedian and in the process one of the most popular television stars of his era, died Thursday at age 94.
Jerry Digney, Mr. Newhart’s publicist, announced that the actor had died in Los Angeles after a series of brief illnesses.
Mr. Newhart, best remembered today as the star of two hit television shows in the 1970s and 1980s, launched his comedy career in the late 1950s. He gained national fame when his routine was recorded on vinyl in 1960 as The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhartwhich went on to win a Grammy for Album of the Year.
While other comedians of the era, such as Lenny Bruce, Mort Sahl, Alan King, Mike Nichols and Elaine May, were making people laugh with their scathing attacks on modern morals, Bob Newhart was a departure. His point of view was modern, but he rarely raised his voice above a halting, almost stammering speech. His only prop was a telephone, used to pretend to be holding a conversation with someone on the other end.
Mr. Newhart was initially hesitant to participate in a weekly television series, fearing that it would overexpose his material. Nevertheless, he accepted an attractive offer from NBC and The Bob Newhart Show premiered on October 11, 1961. Despite Emmy and Peabody Awards, the half-hour variety show was canceled after just one season.
He waited 10 years before undertaking another Bob Newhart Showin 1972. This was a situation comedy in which Newhart played a Chicago psychologist living in a penthouse with his schoolteacher wife, Suzanne Pleshette. Their neighbors and patients, notably Bill Daily as an air navigator, formed a zany, neurotic group that provided an ideal counterpoint to Newhart’s deadpan commentary.
PHOTO JEROME T NAKAGAWA, ASSOCIATED PRESS ARCHIVES
Bob Newhart
The series, one of the most acclaimed of the 1970s, continued until 1978.
Four years later, the actor launched another series, simply titled Newhart. This time, he played a successful New York writer who decides to reopen a long-closed Vermont inn. Again, Newhart was a calm, reasonable man surrounded by a group of eccentric locals. Again, the series was a huge hit, running for eight seasons on CBS.
The comedian memorably bowed out in 1990 when Newhart – in his old Chicago psychologist persona – woke up in bed with Pleshette, grimacing as he told her about the strange dream he’d had: “I was an innkeeper in this crazy little town in Vermont. The handyman still didn’t get the gist of it, and then there were these three lumberjacks, but only one of them would talk.”
The scene parodied an episode of Dallas in which a key character was killed, then resurrected when his death was revealed to have occurred in a dream.
Two later series had comparative flops: Bobin 1992-93, and George & Leo1997-98. Although nominated several times, he never won an Emmy for his work on the sitcom. “I guess they think I’m not acting. That it’s just Bob being Bob,” he sighed.
Over the years, Bob Newhart has also appeared in several films, usually in comedic roles. Among them: Catch 22, In and Out, Legally Blonde 2 And Elfin the role of the little father of his adopted son Will Ferrell.
His most recent appearances include Horrible Bosses and TV series The Librarians, The Big Bang Theory And Young Sheldon.