Obit: Wilford Brimley, actor, musician (1934-2020)

Subject: Obit: Wilford Brimley, actor, musician 1934-2020
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Aug 20 - 01:03 PM

So much about this man I didn't know! I didn't copy the entire obit, just a few tidbits. The New York Times generally has durable links and is easily searchable

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/01/obituaries/wilford-brimley-dead.html

Wilford Brimley, a portly actor with a walrus mustache who found his niche playing cantankerous coots in “Absence of Malice,” “The Natural,” “Cocoon” and other films, died on Saturday in a hospital in St. George, Utah. He was 85.

He had been sick for two months with a kidney ailment, said his agent, Lynda Bensky.

Mr. Brimley had played the Walton Mountain resident Horace Brimley in a recurring role on the television series “The Waltons” when Michael Douglas, the producer of “The China Syndrome,” gave him his breakthrough role: Ted Spindler, an assistant engineer at a nuclear plant.

In the film’s climactic scene, in which he is being interviewed by a crusading television reporter played by Jane Fonda, Mr. Brimley delivered an impassioned defense of his boss (Jack Lemmon), who had precipitated a crisis to draw public attention to defects at the plant.

In an article for The New York Times singling out Mr. Brimley as a talent to watch, Janet Maslin called him “the mustachioed man who very nearly steals the ending of ‘China Syndrome’ from Jane Fonda.”

Mr. Brimley followed up with a small but memorable performance as a pugnacious district attorney in “Absence of Malice” and with supporting roles in “The Natural,” as the put-upon manager of a losing baseball team, and “The Firm,” in which he played the sinister head of security at an unsavory law firm.

In Ron Howard’s 1985 fantasy film “Cocoon,” Mr. Brimley delivered one of his most engaging performances, as a Florida retiree who, with Don Ameche and Hume Cronyn, regains his youth after swimming in a magic pool.

“Wilford’s a testy guy, not an easy guy to work with all the time, but he has great instincts,” Mr. Howard told The Times in 1985. “Many of his scenes were totally improvised.”

Tony, as he was known, dropped out of school at 14 and worked as a cowboy in Idaho, Nevada and Arizona before enlisting in the Marine Corps, which sent him to the Aleutian Islands. After leaving the service, he worked as a ranch hand, wrangler and blacksmith. Briefly, he was a bodyguard for Howard Hughes.

He began shoeing horses for television and film westerns, and gradually took nonspeaking roles on horseback. He appeared as a stuntman in “Bandolero!,” in an uncredited role in “True Grit” and as a blacksmith in the television series “Kung Fu.”

"He had a pleasant singing voice and recorded several albums of jazz standards, including “This Time the Dream’s on Me” and “Wilford Brimley With the Jeff Hamilton Trio.” He could more than hold his own as a guitarist too."

If you scroll down from that link you'll find a number of other links to his singing and music performances.

Subject: RE: Obit: Wilford Brimley, actor, musician (1934-2020)
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 02 Aug 20 - 01:25 PM

I can't remember why now..

But a few months ago I enjoyed some of his youtube interviews..
.. and a harmonica performance...

Subject: RE: Obit: Wilford Brimley, actor, musician (1934-2020)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Aug 20 - 10:35 PM

Wilford Brimley on IMDb. It lists acting and stunts and narration. You have to go to YouTube or other sites for his music.