British character actor Sam Kelly (Roger Michael Kelly) died of cancer on June 14, aged 70. He appeared in episodes of TV’s Rentaghost, Virtual Murder (‘A Dream of Dracula’) and The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (‘Transylvania, January 1918’), along with the films Tiffany Jones and Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang (aka Nanny McPhee Returns). He portrayed “The Wizard” in the London stage production of the musical Wicked from 2009-10, and briefly returned to the role in 2013.
British stuntman and actor Terry Richards (David Terrence Richards), best known for playing the Arab swordsman shot by Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark, died the same day, aged 81. He did stunts in seven James Bond films, starting with From Russia with Love, along with The Empire Strikes Back, Superman II, Krull, Brazil, Red Sonja, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, The Princess Bride, Willow, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Clive Barker’s Nightbreed, Total Recall (1990) and Shadowchaser. Richards also appeared in Flash Gordon (1980), Haunted Summer and episodes of TV’s Adam Adamant Lives!, The Avengers, Blakes 7, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles and Space Precinct.
82-year-old American actor, presenter and radio disc jockey Casey Kasem (Kemal Amen Kasem), the voice of Scooby-Doo’s sidekick “Norville ‘Shaggy’ Rogers” for forty years and Batman’s partner “Robin” for seventeen years, died of complications from Lewy body dementia on June 15. He had been suffering from Parkinson’s disease. Kasem was in the movies The Incredible 2-Headed Transplant, Doomsday Machine, The Night That Panicked America and The Dark, and episodes of TV’s The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries (‘Mystery of the Hollywood Phantom’) and Fantasy Island. A prolific voice actor, he contributed to such animated TV shows as The Batman/Superman Hour, Scooby-Doo Where Are You!, Super-Friends, Yogi’s Space Race, The Flintstones Meet Rockula and Frankenstone, Battle of the Planets, Captain Caveman and the Teen Angels, The Transformers and Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated. In the late 1960s, Kasem executive produced and appeared in two exploitation biker movies, The Glory Stompers and The Cycle Savages.
French actor Jacques Bergerac died the same day, aged 87. He starred in the 1960 movie The Hypnotic Eye, and also appeared in episodes of TV’s Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Get Smart and Batman. Bergerac was married (1953-57) to American actresses Ginger Rogers and (1959-64) Dorothy Malone.
82-year-old American comedian Steve Rossi (Joseph Charles Michael Tafarella), one half of a comedy team with Marty Allen, died of cancer of the aesophogus in Las Vegas on June 22. The duo appeared in the sci-spy spoof The Last of the Secret Agents? while Allen and Rossi Meet Dracula and Frankenstein was announced in 1974 but apparently never made. Rossi was also in the low budget comedy The Man from O.R.G.Y.
American character actor Eli [Herschel] Wallach died on June 24, aged 98. Best remembered for his role as “Tuco” the bandit in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, he was also in the movies The Angel Levine, A Cold Night’s Death, The Sentinel (with John Carradine) and Circle of Iron (with Christopher Lee). On TV, Wallach appeared in episodes of Lights Out (‘Rappaccini’s Daughter’), Shirley Temple’s Storybook, Batman (as “Mr. Freeze”), Orson Welles’ Great Mysteries, Tales of the Unexpected, Worlds Beyond, Highway to Heaven, Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1988) and Veritas: The Quest. He was also the reader of the audio book of Stephen King’s Insomnia. Wallach was married to actress Anne Jackson and received an honorary Academy Award in 2010.
Norma McCarty, who was briefly married to film-maker Edward D. Wood, Jr. from 1955-56, died on June 27, aged 93. She appeared as “Edith” the stewardess in Wood’s infamous Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959) and was featured in such documentaries about the cross-dressing director as The Incredibly Strange Film Show, The Haunted World of Edward D. Wood, Jr. and E! Mysteries & Scandals.
American actor Meshach Taylor, a regular on the CBS-TV sitcom Designing Women (1986-93), died of cancer on June 28, aged 67. He appeared in the movies Damien: Omen II, The Howling, The Beast Within, Explorers, Warning Sign, Mannequin, Ultra Warrior, Mannequin On the Move, Double Double Toil and Trouble, Virtual Seduction and Hyenas. Taylor was also in episodes of TV’s The Incredible Hulk and ALF, while on Broadway he played “Lumiere” in the stage production of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast.
American actor Don Matheson, who starred as “Mark Wilson” in Irwin Allen’s TV series Land of the Giants (1968-70), died of lung cancer on June 29, aged 84. A former Detroit policeman and Korean war veteran, he also appeared in The Alfred Hitchcock Hour and Allen’s Lost in Space, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and Alice in Wonderland (1985), along with the 1990 movie Dragonfight. His second wife was his Land of the Giants co-star Deanna Lund.
American character actor Bob Hastings (Robert Francis Hastings), a regular on TV’s McHale’s Navy (1962-66), died of prostate cancer on June 30, aged 89. He appeared in the 1950s science fiction TV shows Captain Video and His Video Rangers, Atom Squad and Tom Corbett Space Cadet, along with episodes of Twilight Zone (‘I Dream of Genie’), Batman, I Dream of Jeanie, The Flying Nun, Kolchak: The Night Stalker (‘The Werewolf’), The Amazing Spider-Man, Wonder Woman, The Incredible Hulk and The Greatest American Hero. Hastings began his career as the voice of “Archie Andrews” on the radio show based on the Archie comic books. He was also the voice of “The Raven” in The Munsters (1964-66) and, for ten years, the voice of “Commissioner James Gordon” in various animated Batman TV shows and video games. The actor was also in the movies The Bamboo Saucer, Disney’s The Strange Monster of Strawberry Cove and Charlie and the Angel, The Billion Dollar Threat and The Munsters’ Revenge (as the “Phantom of the Opera”). Hastings made a point of never charging fans for his autograph at nostalgia conventions, saying: “I am pleased that people remember the shows I did”.