Buddy Ebsen Dies At 95!

[Overtake]

CNN

LOS ANGELES, July 7 — Buddy Ebsen, the loose-limbed Broadway dancer who achieved stardom and riches in the television series “The Beverly Hillbillies” and “Barnaby Jones,” died Sunday morning at Torrance Memorial Medical Center in Torrance, said Pam Hope, an administrative nursing supervisor. He was 95.
EBSEN AND HIS sister Vilma danced through Broadway shows and MGM musicals of the 1930s. When she retired, Ebsen continued on his own, dancing with Shirley Temple and turning dramatic actor.

Ebsen, right, starred in "The Beverly Hillbillies" with, left to right, Max Baer, Bea Benaderet, Donna Douglas and Irene Ryan.

Except for an allergy to aluminum paint, he would have been one of the Yellow Brick Road quartet in the classic “The Wizard of Oz.” After 10 days of filming, Ebsen, playing the Tin Man, fell ill because of the aluminum makeup on his skin and was replaced by Jack Haley.
Television brought Ebsen’s amiable personality to the home screen, first as Fess Parker’s sidekick in “Davy Crockett.”
As Jed Clampett, the easygoing head of a newly rich Ozark family plunked down in snooty Beverly Hills, Ebsen became a national favorite. While scorned by most critics, “The Beverly Hillbillies” attracted as many as 60 million viewers on CBS between 1962 and 1971.
“As I recall, the only good notice was in the Saturday Review,” Ebsen once said. “The critic said the show possessed ‘social comment combined with a high Nielsen, an almost impossible achievement in these days.’ I kinda liked that.”
The show was still earning good ratings when it was canceled by CBS because advertisers shunned a series that attracted primarily a rural audience.
Ebsen returned to series TV in 1973 as “Barnaby Jones,” a private investigator forced out of retirement to solve the murder of his son Hal, who had taken over the business.

‘BARNABY JONES’ WAS PANNED, TOO
“Barnaby Jones” also drew critical blasts. But Ebsen’s folksy manner and a warm relationship with his daughter-in-law, played by Lee Meriwether, made the series a success.
“With such a glut of private-eye shows, I didn’t see how another one could succeed,” Ebsen once said. “I really thought the network was making a mistake.” But the series clicked and lasted until 1980.
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“I’m the luckiest actor alive,” Ebsen said in 1978. “There’s not anyone I’d trade jobs with right now.”
Ebsen, who was 6 feet 3, jerked sodas until he landed a chorus job in the 1928 “Whoopee,” starring Eddie Cantor. The dancer sent for his sister Vilma and they formed a dancing team that played vaudeville, supper clubs and shows such as “Flying Colors” and “Ziegfeld Follies.”
A screen test led to an MGM contract for the dance team, and they were a hit in “Broadway Melody of 1936.” Buddy’s style was far removed from that of the reigning dance king of films, Fred Astaire. The angular Ebsen moved with a smooth, sliding shuffle, his arms gyrating like a wind-blown scarecrow. He made a charming partner with the tiny Shirley Temple in “Captain January.”
His other films of the ’30s included “Banjo on My Knee,” “Four Girls in White,” “Girl of the Golden West” (Jeanette MacDonald-Nelson Eddy) and “My Lucky Star” (Sonja Henie). His first dramatic role was in “Yellow Jack” with Robert Montgomery.
Ebsen was earning $2,000 a week at MGM in 1938, when studio boss Louis B. Mayer summoned him and announced: “Ebsen, in order to give you the parts you deserve, we must own you.”
The dancer recalled that he replied: “I’ll tell you what kind of a fool I am, Mr. Mayer, I can’t be owned.” He quit his contract, returning to touring as a dancer and playing Chicago for more than a year in a farce, “Good Night, Ladies.” He served three years in the Coast Guard during World War II.

THE DISNEY CONNECTION
Ebsen toured in “Show Boat,” then returned to Hollywood. Producers asked his agent: “Why hasn’t he been working in pictures?” His luck began to change when d