This page uses content from the Larry Blyden biography page on the English version of Wikipedia and is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. This list of authors can be seen in the page history. Rotten Tomatoes disclaims any and all warranties as to the accuracy or reliability of the content.
Larry Blyden (June 23, 1925 - June 6, 1975) was an American actor.
He was born as Ivan Lawrence Blieden in Houston, Texas, and died in Morocco a car accident, shortly before his 50th birthday.
Career
Blyden's career had 3 distinct phases. For most of his career, he was known as a good, solid character actor for TV and also as a highly in demand Broadway actor. As for as television is concerned, he starred in one sitcom, "Harry's Girls", which ran from 1963 to 1964. In this adaptation of the Robert E. Sherwood play "Idiot's Delight," Blyden starred as Harry, who was a vaudeville style performer constantly getting into trouble and falling in love. Other than his one starring role, Blyden did many, many guest performances on dramatic anthology series such as Playhouse 90, Omnibus, the Loretta Young Show and many, many others along with The Twilight Zone and other non-anthology dramatic programs. Although he was generally cast as a nice guy, his two Twilight Zone episodes display an impressive range as he takes on two very different jerks: the tough-talking hood who dies and finds the afterlife a little too pleasant in the classic episode A Nice Place to Visit, and the titular vain, cowardly cowboy star in the comedic episode Showdown with Rance McGrew.
Blyden was an in-demand Broadway and off-Broadway actor. He starred in shows such as Mister Roberts (where he played the role later played by Jack Lemmon in the film version), Harold, Foxy, The Apple Tree and A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum, for which he won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical for the role of Hysterium, a slave. His performance in Flower Drum Song as Sammy Fong also was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical.
Late in his career, once he had reached the age where actors typically get less work, he became a game show presenter and MC, starting with Personality in 1967. He also hosted You're Putting Me On, The Movie Game and finally and most successfully, What's My Line?. When he died, he was about to host the Mark Goodson-Bill Todman produced show, Showoffs, which was eventually hosted by Bobby Van.
Blyden also had a brief and rather uneventful film career. He played secondary parts in the films Kiss Them For Me (1957), The Bachelor Party (also 1957), and On A Clear Day You Can See Forever (1970).
In all of these endeavors, Larry was warm, friendly and gregarious. Of all of the What's My Line hosts, he was the only one who seemed to completely become involved in the occupations of the contestants. As the Game Shows '75 site notes, Larry brightened things up considerably when he took over as host. His most common expressions were "That's Terrific!" or "I Can Do That!" when presented with a new challenge. According to Gil Fates' book What's My Line from 1978, Larry's house was full of all sorts of nicknacks that he had gotten from the show and elsewhere. In fact, he was so big into collectibles that the producers of the show had to dissuade him from taking home certain large items.
Personal life
Larry was married to actress and dancer Carol Haney (1925-64) from 1955 to 1962. The couple had 2 children, Joshua (1957-2000) and Ellen (1960-present).
Larry was also known as a lover of the ladies. His favorite saying, according to Fates' book, was "I'd love to jump her bones!" Given that he wasn't considered a "hunk" in the typical sense, one has the feeling that his personality won a lot of women over.
References
External links
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify the biographical information on this page under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation.
11%
31%
76%
