Lawrence Dobkin (16 September 1919, New York City – 28 October 2002, Los Angeles, California) was an American television director, actor and television screenwriter whose career spanned seven decades.
Dobkin was a prolific performer during the Golden Age of Radio. His voice was used to narrate the classic western Broken Arrow (1950) and The Robe (1953). His film performances include Sweet Smell of Success (1957) and North by Northwest (1959). He announced the landmark television series Naked City (1958–1963), closing each episode with the statement, "There are eight million stories in the naked city, and this has been one of them."
A former child actor, Dobkin began working in radio to pay for his studies at the Yale School of Drama. He understudied on Broadway before serving with a radio propaganda unit of the Air Force during World War II. When he returned to network radio he was one of five actors who played the detective Ellery Queen. In The New Adventures of Nero Wolfe (1950–1951), Dobkin played detective Archie Goodwin opposite Sydney Greenstreet's Nero Wolfe.
While playing Louie, The Saint's cab-driving sidekick on NBC radio in 1951, he was asked to step into the lead role of Simon Templar to replace Tom Conway for a single episode — making Dobkin one of the few actors to portray Leslie Charteris' literary creation.
His other radio work included Escape (1947–1954), Gunsmoke (1952–1961) and the anthology series Lux Radio Theater. "The few of us who are left," Dobkin said of his radio days not long before he died, "keep telling each other that we never had it so good."
Continuing to work as a voice actor throughout his career, Dobkin contributed to the video game Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear (1999).
Dobkin began a prolific career in television in 1946, working as a actor, narrator and director. Often cast as the villain, he portrayed Dutch Schultz in TV's The Untouchables and a mass murderer in the 1972 pilot for The Streets of San Francisco. He received an Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Drama for his work in the CBS Playhouse program, "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" (1967). In 1991 Dobkin appeared on a episode of the TV series Night Court as State Supreme Court Justice Welch.
As writer, Dobkin created the character of Grizzly Adams for the 1974 film and the 1977–1978 NBC-TV series. He began directing for television in 1960, and his work in this area included the pilot and episodes of The Munsters (1964) and 16 episodes of The Waltons (1972–1981).
Dobkin's notable supporting film roles include Twelve O'Clock High (1949), The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), Julius Caesar (1953), The Ten Commandments (1956), The Defiant Ones (1958) and Patton (1970). In an uncredited performance in Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest, Dobkin has a memorable line as an intelligence official who remarks on the plight of the hapless protagonist, on the run for murder after being mistaken for a person who doesn't exist: "It's so horribly sad. Why is it I feel like laughing?"
On June 24, 1962, he married actress Joanna Barnes; they had no children, but he had one daughter by his first wife. Dobkin married actress Anne Collings in 1970 and had three children. His identical-twin daughters followed him into the business — Kristy Dobkin as a writer, and Kaela Dobkin as an actress.
He was cremated and his ashes were scattered at sea.
External links
Lawrence Dobkin at the Internet Movie Database
Lawrence Dobkin article at Memory Alpha, a Star Trek wiki
Lawrence Dobkin at Find A Grave
The New York Times movies (All Movie Guide)
Lawrence Dobkin as The Saint
References
^ Vallance, Tom, Obituary: Lawrence Dobkin; Prolific and Versatile Character Actor. The Independent (London), November 9, 2002
^ The Saintly Bible profile of Lawrence Dobkin; retrieved April 10, 2008
^ Vallance, Tom, Obituary: Lawrence Dobkin; The Independent (London), November 9, 2002
^ Lawrence Dobkin, All Movie Guide
^ Kristy Dobkin at the Internet Movie Database
^ Kaela Dobkin at the Internet Movie Database
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Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Dobkin"
Categories: 1919 births | 2002 deaths | American television actors | American television directors | American screenwriters | Deaths from cardiovascular disease | New York actors
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