Dick Martin

At 86 years old, Dick Martin has this physical status:

Thomas Richard Martin (January 30, 1922 – May 24, 2008), known professionally as Dick Martin, was an American comedian and director.

He was known for his role as the co-host of the sketch comedy program Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In from 1968 to 1973.

Personal life

Martin married singer Peggy Connelly in 1957. They divorced prior to 1968 and he married Playboy Playmate and Beyond the Valley of the Dolls star Dolly Read in 1971. Martin and Read divorced in June 1974, but remarried in 1978 and remained married until his death. His son Richard Martin is a television director, film director and film editor.

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Early life and career

Martin was born in Battle Creek, Michigan, to William, a salesman, and Ethel Martin, a homemaker. The family migrated to Detroit, Michigan, where he suffered with tuberculosis in his youth, which kept him out of the military.

Martin began writing for Duffy's Tavern, a radio situation comedy. Rowan and Martin, he and Dan Rowan formed the comedy team in 1952 and performed in nightclubs around the country and elsewhere. Martin, a mainstay of their show for years, played a sobby drunken Shakespearean actor. They could often be seen as host-performers on NBC's Colgate Comedy Hour, alternating with Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis and other more established names. They appeared in Hal Kanter's comedy Western Once Upon a Horse in 1958, which was a box office failure. They begged NBC to end their deal four years early in 1960, and the network obliged.

During the first season of her comeback comedy The Lucy Show, Martin appeared solo, playing the next-door neighbor to Lucille Ball. When He and Rowan were asked to host the summer replacement series for The Dean Martin Show in 1966, they returned to the nightclub circuit. In the 1966 Doris Day film The Glass Bottom Boat, he co-starred.

Later career

Martin also established himself as a comedy writer. He produced episodes of more than 20 different TV comedy series, beginning with The Bob Newhart Show. Martin became the head director of the 1980s sitcom Newhart. On the latter's short-lived series Bob on CBS (1992–93), where he played Buzz Loudermilk and directed several of the series' episodes, he continued his friendship with him.

Martin appeared in two episodes on Coach as Peter Plunkett, a childhood friend of Luther VanDam. Martin Fine, a homeless man who appears in a 1998 episode of The Nanny, stars Fran Fine as a homeless man in a park that turns out to be Preston Collier, one of New York City's richest men.

He appeared in the Canadian film North of Pittsburgh, directed by his son Richard, in 1992. On 3rd Rock from the Sun in 1996, Martin guest appeared as sociology professor Dr. Ben Littmeyer.

He appeared in an episode of Baywatch in 1997. Ed, an old World War II soldier who was trying to give a buddy a proper burial, died.

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