Dennis Weaver
Birthday:
Birthplace:
Not Available
A track star at the University of Oklahoma, Dennis Weaver went on to serve as a Navy Pilot during World War II. After failing to make the 1948 U.S. decathalon Olympic team, Weaver accepted the invitation of his college chum Lonny Chapman to give the New York theatre world a try. He understudied Chapman as "Turk Fisher" in the Broadway production Come Back Little Sheba, eventually taking over the role in the national company. Deciding that acting was to his liking, Weaver enrolled at the Actors' Studio, supporting his family by selling vacuum cleaners, tricycles and ladies' hosiery. On the recommendation of his Actors' Studio classmate Shelley Winters, Weaver was signed to a contract at Universal studios in 1952, where he made his film debut in The Redhead From Wyoming (1952). Though his acting work increased steadily over the next three years, he still had to take odd jobs to make ends meet. He was making a delivery for the florist's job where he worked when he was informed that he'd won the role of deputy Chester Goode on the TV adult western Gunsmoke. So as not to be continually upstaged by his co-star James Arness (who, at 6'7", was five inches taller than the gangly Weaver), he adopted a limp for his character--a limp which, along with Chester's reedy signature line "Mis-ter Diillon" and the deputy's infamously bad coffee, brought Weaver fame, adulation and a 1959 Emmy Award. Though proud of his work on Gunsmoke--"I don't think any less seriously of Chester than I did about King Lear in college"--Weaver began feeling trapped by Chester sometime around the series' fifth season. Having already proven his versatility in his film work (notably his portrayal of the neurotic motel night clerk in Orson Welles' Touch of Evil [1958]), Weaver saw to it that the Gunsmoke producers permitted him to accept as many "outside" TV assignments as his schedule would allow. Twice during his run as Chester, Weaver quit the series to pursue other projects. He left Gunsmoke permanently in 1964, whereupon he was starred in the one-season "dramedy" series Kentucky Jones (1965). In 1967, he headlined a somewhat more successful weekly, Gentle Ben (1967-69) in which he and everyone else in the cast played second fiddle to a trained bear (commenting upon his relationship with his "co-star", Weaver replied "I liked him, but it was a cold relationship...Ben didn't know me from a bag of doughnuts.") The most successful of Weaver's post-Gunsmoke TV series was McCloud, in which, from 1970 to 1977, he played deputy marshal Sam McCloud, a New Mexico lawman transplanted to the Big Apple. In addition to his series work, Weaver has starred in several made-for-TV movies over the past 25 years, the most famous of which was the Steven Spielberg-directed nailbiter Duel (1971). Dennis Weaver is the father of actor Robby Weaver, who co-starred with his dad on the 1980 TV series Stone.
Highest Rated Movies
Filmography
MOVIES
RATING | TITLE | CREDIT | BOX OFFICE | YEAR |
---|---|---|---|---|
No Score Yet | Escape from Wildcat Canyon |
|
— | 2004 |
No Score Yet | Hopalong Cassidy: Public Hero #1 |
|
— | 2001 |
50% | High Noon |
|
— | 2000 |
No Score Yet | The Virginian |
|
— | 2000 |
No Score Yet | Submerged |
|
— | 2000 |
No Score Yet | Stolen Women, Captured Hearts |
|
— | 1997 |
No Score Yet | Two Bits and Pepper |
|
— | 1996 |
No Score Yet | Smithsonian's Great Battles of the Civil War, Vol. 5 |
|
— | 1992 |
No Score Yet | Relax with Dennis Weaver |
|
— | 1990 |
No Score Yet | The Return of Sam McCloud |
|
— | 1988 |
No Score Yet | Disaster at Silo 7 |
|
— | 1988 |
No Score Yet | Reincarnation: Coming Back |
|
— | 1988 |
No Score Yet | Bluffing It |
|
— | 1987 |
No Score Yet | A Winner Never Quits |
|
— | 1986 |
No Score Yet | Going for the Gold: The Bill Johnson Story |
|
— | 1985 |
No Score Yet | Cocaine: One Man's Seduction |
|
— | 1983 |
No Score Yet | Don't Go to Sleep |
|
— | 1982 |
No Score Yet | The Day the Loving Stopped |
|
— | 1981 |
No Score Yet | The Ordeal of Dr. Mudd |
|
— | 1980 |
No Score Yet | Battered |
|
— | 1978 |
No Score Yet | Centennial |
|
— | 1978 |
No Score Yet | Intimate Strangers |
|
— | 1977 |
88% | Duel |
|
— | 1972 |
55% | What's the Matter with Helen? |
|
— | 1971 |
No Score Yet | A Man Called Sledge |
|
— | 1971 |
No Score Yet | McCloud: Who Killed Miss U.S.A.? (Portrait of a Dead Girl ) |
|
— | 1970 |
No Score Yet | Mission Batangas |
|
— | 1968 |
No Score Yet | Gentle Giant |
|
— | 1967 |
No Score Yet | Way...Way Out |
|
— | 1966 |
No Score Yet | Duel at Diablo |
|
— | 1966 |
No Score Yet | The Gallant Hours |
|
— | 1960 |
95% | Touch of Evil |
|
— | 1958 |
43% | Dragnet |
|
— | 1956 |
No Score Yet | Storm Fear |
|
— | 1955 |
No Score Yet | Chief Crazy Horse |
|
— | 1955 |
No Score Yet | Ten Wanted Men |
|
— | 1955 |
80% | The Bridges at Toko-Ri |
|
— | 1954 |
No Score Yet | Dangerous Mission |
|
— | 1954 |
No Score Yet | War Arrow |
|
— | 1953 |
No Score Yet | The Nebraskan |
|
— | 1953 |
No Score Yet | Law and Order |
|
— | 1953 |
No Score Yet | It Happens Every Thursday |
|
— | 1953 |
No Score Yet | The Mississippi Gambler |
|
— | 1953 |
50% | The Redhead From Wyoming |
|
— | 1953 |
No Score Yet | The Lawless Breed |
|
— | 1953 |
No Score Yet | The Golden Blade |
|
— | 1953 |
No Score Yet | Column South |
|
— | 1953 |
No Score Yet | Horizons West |
|
— | 1952 |
TV
RATING | TITLE | CREDIT | YEAR |
---|---|---|---|
No Score Yet |
Wildfire
2005-2008
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Touched by an Angel
1994-2003
|
|
|
85% |
The Simpsons
1989
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Weakest Link (2001)
2001-2003
|
|
|
30% |
The Beast
2001
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Magnum, P.I.
1980-1988
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Gunsmoke
1955-1975
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
The Flip Wilson Show
1970-1974
|
|
|
82% |
The Twilight Zone
1959-1964
|
|
|
No Score Yet |
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
1955-1962
|
|
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Quotes from Dennis Weaver's Characters
David Mann: | Okay.. Okay..! You want to play games? |