A true comedy legend has passed. Jesse Donald Knotts was born July 21, 1924 in Morgantown, West Virginia. He died at age 81 on February 23, 2006 of pulmonary and respiratory complications at Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Beverly Hills, California.
Besides his signature role as Barney Fife, he was, of course, the swingin' landlord Ralph Furley on Three's Company. His character and presence were the only good justification for the existence of that silly show, really, but justify the show he did.
It strikes me slightly curious that it apparently fell to corporate spokesmen for TVLand to make the official public announcement of Knott's passing. Not that there's anything wrong with that. A family spokesman or perhaps hospital representative from Cedars-Sinai would have seemed more obvious, though.
He was also a pretty significant film star, particularly with the Disney family stuff. The Shakiest Gun in the West would be the one that I remember best.
One particularly cool thing to look for would be the 1958 film No Time for Sergeants. This film cast him as a nervous military psychologist having great trouble with the dumb country bumpkin Pvt. Will Stockdale, played by Andy Griffith. This was their early work together, predating The Andy Griffith Show. I think of this Cpl. John C. Brown character as a prototype for Barney Fife.
But then again, his early "man in the street" segments on Steve Allen's show showed a lot of that special corner of the human experience that Knotts illuminated uniquely.
Anyway, I don't know that I have any particularly uniquely insightful thing to say about him, unless it's to note that Barney Fife was a true everyman. Who doesn't understand directly and viscerally in their own souls Barney's blustering against raging insecurities, and struggling against the limits of his coping abilities day to day? There's a little bit of Barney Fife in all of us, isn't there?
Article comments
1 - El Bicho
I especially enjoyed his work with Tim Conway even though they aren't considered a comedy team. They played off each other extremly well.
Probably the first film I remember Knotts from is The Incredible Mr. Limpett. He had a hysterical cameo on Newhart during an episode where Dick was given his own sitcom. When is that show coming to DVD?
2 - RJ Elliott
Oddly enough, what sticks out most in my mind was his "appearances" on the Scooby-Doo cartoon show. The dude was funny even when he was using just his voice!
RIP...
3 - DJRadiohead
What kind of world are we living in where Don Knots can be allowed to go? Such a shame. So many laughs.