Ralph Waite, the actor who played John Walton on The Waltons, died on Thursday, according to reports.
-
Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Ralph Waite
jaypay111 — 12 years ago(February 13, 2014 06:21 PM)
Ralph Waite, the actor who played John Walton on The Waltons, died on Thursday, according to reports.
He passed away at his home in South Palm Desert, accountant Steve Gordon told the Hollywood Reporter.
He was nominated for an Emmy in 1978 for the show.
He also appeared in Bones and NCIS.
RATS! RATS! Bones pal Ralph Waite has passed away, Bones creator Hart Hanson tweeted. RATS. A truly lovely man we liked a lot.
He also appeared in Days of Our Lives and the Roots miniseries on TV.
Waite appeared in movies including Cool Hand Luke, Five Easy Pieces, The Bodyguard, and Cliffhange -
jaypay111 — 12 years ago(February 13, 2014 06:30 PM)
The Waltons' Actor Ralph Waite Dead at 85
He was nominated for an Emmy in 1978 for his portrayal of the middle-American paterfamilias.
Ralph Waite, who was beloved to TV viewers as the ultimate father figure, John Walton, on The Waltons, has died. He passed away at midday on Thursday at his home in South Palm Desert, Steve Gordon, the accountant for the Waite family, told The Hollywood Reporter.
He was nominated for an Emmy in 1978 for his portrayal of the middle-American paterfamilias. He starred on The Waltons for nine years and directed 15 episodes. Waite also performed in the vaunted mini-series Roots, for which he received a 1977 Emmy nomination.
Prior to his role on The Waltons, Waite had been in only one other TV show, a Nichols episode.
Waite also performed in the vaunted mini-series Roots, for which he received a 1977 Emmy nomination.
More recently, he had a recurring role as Reverend Norman Balthus on HBO's Carnivale, a part befitting a man who once served as an ordained minister on Long Island. He also appeared as Jackson Gibbs in NCIS over the course of several seasons.
Waite was the founder and director of the Los Angeles Actors Theatre, 1c84which he established in 1975. To get the company off the ground, Waite allocated $50,000 of his own money to produce and direct revivals of The Hairy Ape and The Kitchen, in which he also performed.
LAAT won many critical awards, including the Margaret Harford Award given by the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle for its consistently high standards, its commitment to adventurous theater and to community involvement.
Multi-faceted, Waite was also an ordained minister, a former social worker and a recovering alcoholic. He channeled that background into a film on the lives of people on L.A.'s skid row, On the Nickel, which he produced/directed/wrote/starred.
Under his own production banner, Ralph Waite Prods, he starred as a criminal lawyer in the 1983 TV series The Mississippi.
TV movies credits include the titular role in The Secret Life of John Chapman, OHMS, Angel City and The Gentleman Bandit.
Politically active, he twice ran unsuccessfully for a Congressional seat, including a run for the seat left vacant by the late Sonny Bono in 1998.
Ralph Waite was born June 22, 1928 in White Plains, New York and graduated from Bucknell University. He later studied for three years at Yale and earned a Bachelor of Divinity degree. At that juncture, he went on to have stints as a social worker for the Westchester County Department of Welfare, as well as publicity director and associate editor at Harper & Row. He was a minister at the United Church of Christ in Garden City, Long Island.
He was a top notch minister and a dynamic actor in the pulpit even then, former parishioner and actor Bill Hayes told TV Guide in 1975. But I don't think Ralph ever enjoyed being asked to conform to the mold or the stereotype expected of most clergymen. He was disturbed by people telling him to straighten his tie or shine his shoes or fix the hole in his sock. He was a very individualistic guy who wanted to be himself.
It was during his ministerial tenure that Waite traveled to his own Damascus, a night he spent with his parishioner Bill Hayes at his acting class. At age 32, Waite left the ministry to pursue acting.
His conversion from the church to the stage was immediately successful. In 1960, Waite got his first stage role in a Broadway production of Blues for Mister Charlie. In his first eight years of acting, he landed appearances in eight Broadway plays, including Hogan's Goat, Watering Place and The Trial of Lee Harvey Oswald. He also performed Blues for Mister Charlie in London.
As his stage career gathered steam, Waite also garnered small roles in top films: Cool Hand Luke and Five Easy Pieces. In 1969, he played in a coming-of-age saga, Last Summer, which starred an up-and-coming Richard Thomas.
His other films include Lawman, The Grissom Gang, Dime Box and Sporting Club.
He had two daughters: Kathleen and Suzanne.
Since 1984, he was married to his third wife, Linda East. -
Hardline_Pro — 12 years ago(February 13, 2014 06:33 PM)
Sad to see him go. He was still a recurring character on NCIS so I wonder what will happen now.
http://www.youtube.com/dinoatcharterdotnet -
Italiano66 — 12 years ago(February 13, 2014 10:19 PM)
I feel that way, too.
The Waltons is one of my all-time favorite shows. Goodnight, Daddy.
RIP, Ralph Waite. Thank you for your memorable contributions to the entertainment industry. You will be greatly missed.
so sad.. just heard about it. He'll be missed:-(