DeForest Kelley

At 79 years old, DeForest Kelley has this physical status:

Jackson DeFort Kelley (January 20, 1920 – June 11, 1999), also known as "Dee" in Westerns and as Dr. Connor, was an American actor, screenwriter, and singer known for his work in Westerns and as Dr. Def.

Leonard "Bones" McCoy of the US Enterprise in the television and film series Star Trek (1966-1991).

Early life

Kelley was born in Toccoa, Georgia, the son of Clora (née Casey) and Ernest David Kelley, a Baptist minister of Irish and southern ancestry. Kelley was named after pioneering electronics engineer Lee de Forest. After his own father, he later named his Star Trek character's father "David." Ernest Casey Kelley, Kelley's older brother, had a younger brother. Kelley was embedded in his father's mission (church) in Conyers, Georgia, and told his father that failing would result in "wreck and ruin."

Kelley was regularly using his musical abilities, and he sang solo in morning church services before his first year at Conyers. Kelley wanted to be a doctor like his uncle, but his family couldn't afford to send him to medical school. He started singing on local radio stations, with a stint on WSB AM in Atlanta. He gained an association with Lou Forbes and his orchestra at the Paramount Theater as a result of Kelley's radio work.

The family departed Conyers for Decatur, Georgia, in 1934. He attended Decatur Boys High School, where he played for the Decatur Bantams baseball team. Kelley also competed in football and other sports. Kelley began working as a drugstore car hop before his 1938 graduation. He spent his weekends in the local theaters.

He made his film debut in New Moon (1940) and nearly took the lead of This Gun for Hire (1942), but Alan Ladd was opted instead.

Kelley served as an enlisted man in the United States Army Air Forces from March 10, 1943, to January 28, 1946, and was assigned to the First Motion Picture Unit in the rank of private first class during World War II. Kelley decided to pursue an acting career and relocated to Southern California permanently after an extended stay with his uncle Casey. He worked as an usher in a local theater in order to save enough money for the move. Kelley's mother pushed her son into a new career choice, but his father was against the idea. Kelley was discovered by a Paramount Pictures scout while filming a United States Navy training video while in California.

Kelley married Carolyn Meagher Kelley in 1945. They had no children.

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Career

Kelley's acting career began in 1947 with the film Fear in the Night. The low-budget film was a hit, bringing him to the attention of a national audience and causing Kelley reason to believe he would soon be a celebrity. His next role, in Variety Girl, established him as a leading actor and culminated in the establishment of his first fan club. However, Kelley did not become a leading man, and his partner Carolyn and he decided not to move to New York City. After three years in New York, the Kelleys returned to Hollywood. He worked on stage and on live television, but it was back to Hollywood.

He appeared in an installment of You Are Here, directed by Walter Cronkite, in California. In the 1949 episode "Legion of Old Timers," the Lone Ranger's television show "The Lone Ranger" played ranch owner Bob Kitteridge. This resulted in an appearance in a Gunfight in the United Kingdom. Morgan Earp (brother to Burt Lancaster's Wyatt Earp) appeared in Corral. Warlock with Henry Fonda and Anthony Quinn followed three film offers, including Warlock with Henry Fonda and Anthony Quinn.

In three episodes of Science Fiction Theatre (season one, episode four, April 30, 1955), DeForest Kelley appeared in three episodes, "Y.O.R.D. "Survival in Box Canyon," season one, episode 34, 1955, "The Long Day"; and season two, episode 24, November 3, 1956.

In 1957, he appeared as a Southern officer in Raintree County, a Civil War film starring Edward Dmytryk, Montgomery Clift, and Lee Marvin. In the World War II-set television series The Silent Service, he appeared in leading roles as a US Navy submarine captain. As Commander Dempsey in season one, "The Spearfish Deliveries," he appeared as Commander Dempsey, and as Lieutenant Commander Enright in the first episode of season two, "The Archerfish Spits Straight." Leonard Nimoy, the series's upcoming Star Trek co-star, appeared in two separate episodes at the same time.

In various representations of the gun battle at the O.K., Kelley appeared three times. Corral is the first time Ike Clanton appeared on the television show You Are There in 1955. Morgan Earp appeared in the 1957 film of the same name two years ago. His third appearance in a third-season Star Trek episode, titled "Spectre of the Gun," was released on October 25, 1968). Tom McLaury appeared on "Spectre of the Arms" this time.

Kelley appeared in episodes of The Donna Reed Show, Perry Mason, Tales of Wells Fargo, Wanted: Dead or Alive, Boots and Saddles, Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater, Riverboat, The Fugitive, Lawman, Can You Carry, Will Travel, The Millionaire, and Lado. Willis appeared on Route 66's "1800 Days to Justice" and "The Clover Throne" in 1962. In the film The View From Pompey's Head, he appeared briefly.

Kelley primarily played villains for nine years. He had a long list of credits, alternating between television and motion pictures. He was afraid of typecasting, but he managed to break away from villains by appearing in Where Love Has Gone and a television pilot named 333 Montgomery. Gene Roddenberry, an ex-cop, wrote the pilot, and a few years later, Kelley appeared in another Roddenberry pilot, but it wasn't developed into a series.

Kelley appeared in at least one radio drama, "Flesh Peddler," a 1957 Suspense episode, in which series producer William M. Robson introduced him as "a brilliant new star in the Hollywood company."

Kelley played a minor supporting role in The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit in which he says "this man's dead, Captain" and "This man is dead" to Gregory Peck, nine years before being cast as Dr. McCoy. In two episodes of the syndicated military drama The Silent Service, based on true accounts of the United States Navy's submarine service, Kelley appeared as Lieutenant Commander James Dempsey. In 1962, he appeared on "The Decision" as a doctor who was sentenced to prison for the assassination of a journalist. On the Star Trek pilot "The Cage," John Hoyt, who later portrayed Dr. Phillip John Boyce, one of Leonard McCoy's predecessors, portrayed the judge in this episode. He appeared in the Virginian episode "Man of Violence" as a "drinking" cavalry doctor with Leonard Nimoy as his patient (Nimoy's character did not survive). Well, not coincidentally, John D. Black, who went on to be a writer-producer on Star Trek, was a contributor. In the Lavatory episode "The Sound of Terror," Kelley appeared as a doctor briefly before Star Trek began filming.

Kelley played Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy from 1966 to 1969 in Star Trek, after refusing Roddenberry's 1964 invitation to play Spock. He portrayed the character in Star Trek: The Animated Series (1973–74) and the first six Star Trek motion pictures (1979 to 1991). Admiral Leonard McCoy, Star Trek: The Next Generation's first episode as Admiral Leonard McCoy, also appeared in "Encounter at Farpoint," the first episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Several aspects of Kelley's history became part of McCoy's description, including his pronunciation of "nuclear" as "nucular."

Kelley became a good friend of Star Trek castmates William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy, who were present at their first meeting in 1964. Kelley's name and the remainder of the cast were included in the end credits during Trek's first season. In the first credits, only Shatner and Nimoy were listed. After Nimoy's role as Kelley's career soared in importance during the first season, he was paid an increase to about $2,500 per episode and saw his third billing begin in the second season. Despite the show's acknowledgement of Kelley as one of its stars, he was frustrated with the greater interest that Shatner received as its lead actor and that Nimoy received because of "Spockamania" among fans.

Kelley was the first cast member of the original Star Trek series program to have written or published an autobiography, according to Terry Lee Rioux of Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas; he wrote it in a posthumously. Kelley rated "The Empath" as his favorite Star Trek television program episode.

Kelley discovered himself a victim of the very typecasting he feared after Star Trek was cancelled in 1969. He appeared in the horror film Night of the Lepus in 1972. Kelley made occasional appearances on television and film, but not so much as playing McCoy in the Star Trek film series. He was earning $50,000 ($208,000 today) each year from appearances at Star Trek conventions as a child in 1978. Kelley was the last live action film appearance for him until Nimoy, the franchise's executive producer, arranged for Kelley to be paid $1 million for Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991), his last live-action film appearance. In 1987, he appeared in the first Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Encounter at Farpoint," in which he played a 137-year-old Dr. McCoy. In The Brave Little Toaster Goes to Mars, Kelley performed Viking 1 in his last film. Kelley's passion for poetry grew as a child, and she eventually published the first two books in an unfinished collection called The Big Bird's Dream and The Dream Goes On.

Kelley joked that one of his biggest concerns was that the words etched on his gravestone would be "He's dead, Jim" during a TLC interview in the late 1990s. "We're not even going to try to resist: Jim Kelley's obituary appeared in Newsweek: "We're dead, Jim," Kelley's. He predicted that his legacy would be the many people McCoy inspired to become doctors the year before his death; "It's something that very few people can say they've done." "I'm proud to say that I have." Kelley was nominated for a role on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1991. He received a Golden Boot Award in 1999, just before he died, for his contribution to the field of Western television and movies.

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