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Woodrow Parfrey (October 5, 1922 — July 29, 1984) was an American film and television actor in the 1960s-early 1980s.

Described as "one of the most interesting character actors to emerge on American film and television in the 1960s", Parfrey was noted for bringing "a quirky charisma to every role he played, from shopkeepers to space-age simians." His noted turn as the unbalanced informer in Broadway's "Advise and Consent" (1961) set the standard for his offbeat, conspiratorial persona in dozens of TV and movie appearances into the 1980's.

Biography

Born Sydney Woodrow Parfrey on October 5, 1922 in New York City, he was orphaned as a teenager and lived in abject poverty during the Depression era. He fought at the Battle of the Bulge during World War II, was wounded and captured by the Germans. Those experiences were credited with helping to set up many of the tough, eccentric characters he played. He married Rosa Ellovich.

Parfrey acted almost entirely on Broadway or regional stage in the late 1940s and 50s. He turned to TV and film in the 60s. Parfrey played many focal TV guest-star roles, mainly in the late sixties, and a few big A-movie parts, most notably as one of the wretched prisoners in Papillon (1973). Parfrey's association with that film's director, Franklin Schaffner, also included a bit as one of the three "See No Evil" orangutan judges in Planet of the Apes (1968). (He would don the prosthetics again a few years later for the pilot of the spinoff TV series.)

In addition, Parfrey also turned up in the unofficial repertory companies of both Clint Eastwood and Don Siegel.

Parfrey died of a heart attack on July 29, 1984 in Los Angeles.

His determination to bring that edgy "something extra" to his profession lives on in his son, the "underground" publisher Adam Parfrey.

External links

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