Dabney Coleman
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Dabney Wharton Coleman (January 3, 1932 – May 16, 2024) was an American actor. Coleman's best known films include 9 to 5 (1980), On Golden Pond (1981), Tootsie (1982), WarGames (1983), Cloak & Dagger (1984), The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984), The Beverly Hillbillies (1993), You've Got Mail (1998), Inspector Gadget (1999), Recess: School's Out (2001), Moonlight Mile (2002), and Rules Don't Apply (2016). Coleman's television roles included the title characters of Buffalo Bill (1983–1984) and The Slap Maxwell Story (1987–1988), as well as Burton Fallin on The Guardian (2001–2004), the voice of Principal Peter Prickly on Recess (1997–2001), and Louis "The Commodore" Kaestner on Boardwalk Empire (2010–2011). He won one Primetime Emmy Award from six nominations and one Golden Globe Award from three nominations. Coleman was a character actor with roles in well over 60 films and television programs to his credit. He trained with Sanford Meisner at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre in New York City from 1958 to 1960. Coleman made his Broadway debut in the short-lived A Call on Kuprin in 1961. In a 1964 episode of Kraft Suspense Theatre titled "The Threatening Eye", Coleman played private investigator William Gunther. Two years later, he played Dr. Leon Bessemer with Bonnie Scott as his wife Judy, neighbors and friends of the protagonist in Season 1 of That Girl, episode 3, "Never Change a Diaper on Opening Night". Noted for his moustache which he grew in 1973, he appeared in the sitcom wearing horn-rimmed glasses and with no facial hair. Other early roles in his career included a U.S. Olympic skiing team coach in Downhill Racer (1969), a high-ranking fire chief in The Towering Inferno (1974), and a wealthy Westerner in Bite the Bullet (1975). He portrayed an FBI agent in Attack on Terror: The FBI vs. the Ku Klux Klan (1975).
Known for
Credits
You've Got Mail (1998)
as Nelson Fox
Stuart Little (1999)
as Dr. Beechwood
WarGames (1983)
as McKittrick
The Towering Inferno (1974)
as Deputy Chief #1
Midway (1976)
as Captain Murray Arnold
The Beverly Hillbillies (1993)
as Milburn Drysdale
Tootsie (1982)
as Ron Carlisle
Nine to Five (1980)
as Franklin M. Hart Jr.
Inspector Gadget (1999)
as Chief Quimby
Domino (2005)
as Drake Bishop
On Golden Pond (1981)
as Bill Ray
The Man with One Red Shoe (1985)
as Cooper
Recess: School's Out (2001)
as Principal Peter Prickly (voice)
This Property Is Condemned (1966)
as Salesman
The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984)
as Martin Price
Rules Don't Apply (2016)
as Raymond Holliday
Dragnet (1987)
as Jerry Caesar
Recess: All Growed Down (2003)
as Principal Prickley (voice)
Young Doctors in Love (1982)
as Dr. Joseph Prang
Rolling Thunder (1977)
as Maxwell
The Scalphunters (1968)
as Jed
Recess: Taking the Fifth Grade (2003)
as Principal Prickly (voice)
Where the Red Fern Grows (2003)
as Grandpa
Recess Christmas: Miracle On Third Street (2001)
as Principal Peter Prickly
Amos & Andrew (1993)
as Chief of Police Cecil Tolliver
Bite the Bullet (1975)
as Jack Parker
Moonlight Mile (2002)
as Mike Mulcahey
A Witch's Way of Love (1997)
as Joel
Callie & Son (1981)
as Randall Bordeaux
The Other Side of the Mountain (1975)
as Dave McCoy
Night of 100 Stars II (1985)
as Self
Plaza Suite (1987)
as Jesse Kiplinger
Moving Target (1973)
Actor
When She Was Bad... (1979)
as Jack Wilson
The Making of Midway (2001)
as Self
Downhill Racer (1969)
as Mayo
Dying Room Only (1973)
as Bob Mitchell
Cloak & Dagger (1984)
as Jack Flack / Hal Osborne
Clifford (1994)
as Gerald Ellis
Exiled (1998)
as Lieutenant Kevin Stolper
Short Time (1990)
as Burt Simpson
Cinderella Liberty (1973)
as Executive Officer
The Trouble with Girls (1969)
as Harrison Wilby
I Love My Wife (1970)
as Frank Donnelly
Meet the Applegates (1990)
as Aunt Bea
North Dallas Forty (1979)
as Emmett Hunter
Char·ac·ter (2012)
as Self
Modern Problems (1981)
as Mark Winslow
The Slender Thread (1965)
as Charlie
Melvin and Howard (1980)
as Judge Keith Hayes
Sworn to Silence (1987)
as Martin Costigan
The Dove (1974)
as Charles Huntley
There Goes the Neighborhood (1992)
as Jeffrey Babitt
How to Beat the High Cost of Living (1980)
as Jack Heintzel
House of Evil (1974)
Actor
Hot to Trot (1988)
as Walter Sawyer
Nothing Personal (1980)
as Dickerson
Kiss My Act (2001)
as Henry
Judicial Consent (1994)
as Charles Mayron
My Date with the President's Daughter (1998)
as President George Richmond
Giving It Up (1999)
as Johnathan Gallant
The Climb (2002)
as Mack
Where the Heart Is (1990)
as Stewart McBain
Happy 100th Birthday, Hollywood (1987)
as Self
Kiss Me... Kill Me (1976)
as Capt. Logan
The President's Plane Is Missing (1973)
as Sen. Bert Haines
Savage! (1973)
as Ted Seligson
Returning Home (1975)
as Al Stephenson
Lincoln (1992)
as Stephen A. Douglas (voice)
Attack on Terror: The FBI vs. the Ku Klux Klan (1975)
as Paul Mathison
Never Forget (1991)
as William Cox
Target Earth (1998)
as Senator Ben Arnold
Bad Ronald (1974)
as Mr. Wood
Viva Knievel! (1977)
as Ralph Thompson
The Muppets Celebrate Jim Henson (1990)
as Self
The Brotherhood of the Bell (1970)
as Agent Shepard
The Return of Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer (1986)
as Dabney Coleman
Still Working 9 to 5 (2022)
as Self
More Than Friends (1978)
as Joshua 'Josh' Harrington
Hard Four (2007)
as Spray Loomis
Black Fist (1977)
as Heineken
Maybe Baby (1988)
as Hal
Murrow (1986)
as William Paley
Pray TV (1980)
as Marvin Fleece
The Case of the Baltimore Girls (1978)
as George Bates
Maneaters Are Loose! (1978)
as McCallum
In the Line of Duty: Kidnapped (1995)
as Arthur Milo
Devil's Food (1996)
as Seymour Kecker
How to Marry a Billionaire: A Christmas Tale (2000)
as John Kennedy
Must Be Santa (1999)
Actor
Guilty of Innocence: The Lenell Geter Story (1987)
as Ed Sigel
Taken (1999)
as Ethan Grover
Dan August: The Jealousy Factor (1980)
as Rick Bessett