Ken Osmond

At 76 years old, Ken Osmond has this physical status:

Kenneth Charles Osmond (born June 7, 1943) is an American actor and former policeman.

Osmond began his career as a child actor on the 1950s television situation comedy Leave It to Beaver, then resurrecting it on 1980s revival series The New Leave It to Beaver.

He found it impossible to find other acting jobs and became a Los Angeles policeman, typecast by the position.

He revived his acting career after being out of jail.

Early life

Osmond was born in Glendale, California, and the son of Pearl (Hand) and Thurman Osmond. His father, a carpenter and stage designer, and his mother, whom he described as "a typical movie mother," had aspired to bring him and his brother, Dayton, into acting. At the age of four, Osmond began attending professional auditions and moved into commercials. After school, his sons attended acting classes; he later studied dance, drama, diction, dialects, martial arts, and equestrian riding.

Personal life

Sandra Purdy married Osmond in 1969. They had two sons, Eric E. Osmond and Christian S. Osmond. Following his release from the service, Osmond managed rental properties in Los Angeles County and made occasional personal appearances at film festivals, collectors' shows, and nostalgia conventions.

Osmond brought a class action lawsuit against the Screen Actors Guild on September 18, 2007, arguing that SAG had amassed $8 million in foreign residuals for American actors but not gave it to the actors.

Osmond began appearing as a celebrity spokesperson for St. Joseph Aspirin in August 2011.

Osmond, along with Christopher J. Lynch, co-author of Eddie: The Life and Times of America's Preeminent Bad Boy, which was published in September 2014. Jerry Mathers wrote the foreword.

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Career

Osmond first appeared in feature films as an extra. He remembered first being cast in the film Plymouth Adventure with Spencer Tracy and Gene Tierney. He appeared in the film So Big starring Jane Wyman and Sterling Hayden for his first speaking role at age 9.

He continued to appear in small films, including Good Morning Miss Dove and Everything But the Truth, and Heard's Home, Lossie, The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, Wagon Train, Fury, Circus Boy, and The Loretta Young Show, as well as numerous guest-starring appearances on television series, including Lassie, The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet. In 1958 on the program "The Deserted House," Henry appeared in the episode "The Deserted House."

In 1959, Osmond appeared in the ABC/Warner Brothers western series Colt.45, starring Wayde Preston. In the episode, John Doucette was played as bounty hunter Lou Gore, while Bing Russell portrayed Jed Coy.

In 1964, Osmond appeared on Petticoat Junction for the first time. As Harold Boggs, he appeared in the episode "The Genghis Keane Story."

In the fall of 1957, 14-year-old Osmond was called into a typical "cattle call" audition to prepare for the position for which he became most recognized, that of Wally Cleaver's best (and worst) neighbour, Eddie Haskell, on the family sitcom Leave It to Beaver. Osmond eventually accepted the position after a string of call-backs to narrow down the field. Eddie's character was supposed to be a "one shot" guest appearance, but those involved in the series were impressed with Osmond's portrayal, and Eddie Haskell later became a memorable character on the series during its entire six-season run. In 97 of the series's 235 episodes, he appeared in 97 of the series's 97 episodes.

Eddie Haskell's portrayal became a cultural standard and archetype for the "behind-your-back" rebel. Eddie Haskell, a teen, was polite and devoted to grownups, but adults' social conventions were mocked behind their backs. He was always trying to involve his friends in activities that would put them in jeopardy. Ward and June Cleaver's parents wished Eddie would not be a role model for their children, but rather someone to point out as an example of what not to do. The word "Eddie Haskell" is used to describe an insincere flatterer or a sycophant even today.

During the show's last years, Osmond served as an armorer in the United States Army Reserve and was granted permission to film episodes in exchange for personal appearances for the Army's Special Services.

Since leaving Leave It to Beaver in 1963, Osmond continued to appear on CBS' Petticoat Junction, The Munsters, and his final appearance in Lassie's "A Matter of Seconds" (1967) as a motorcycle delivery man who gives the hitchhiking collie a lift in his sidecar. He appeared in the films C'mon Let's Live a Little (1967) and With Six You Get Eggroll (1968). However, Eddie Haskell, a typecast, was unemployed, and he had a difficult time finding steady jobs. In a radio interview with radio host Stu Shostak in 2008, Osmond told radio host Stu Shostak, "I was very typecast." It's a death sentence. You're going to be typecast in Hollywood. Eddie has been kind to me, so I'm not complaining, but I'm finding it difficult to come by. I bought my first house in 1968, but I was going to start a family and I wanted a job, so I went out and signed up for the Los AngelesPD.

Osmond began with the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) in 1970 and grew a mustache in an effort to remain anonymous among ordinary people, but not his coworkers. He served as a motorcycle cop.

While walking in a foot chase with a suspected vehicle robbery on September 20, 1980, Osmond was struck by three bullets. He was shielded from two bullets by his bullet-resistant vest, with the third bullet ricocheting off his belt buckle. In a November 1992 episode of CBS' Top Cops, the shooting was later dramatized. In 1984, Osmond applied for a disability pension, but the Los Angeles Board of Pension Commissioners denied his request by a 4–2 vote following an evidentiary hearing in 1986. Osmond appealed the decision to the Superior Court, and a judge reversed the Board's decision and gave Osmond a lifetime pension and retired from the service in 1988.

A tale about Osmond's transformation into rock star Alice Cooper was widely circulated in the early 1970s. The rumors started when a college newspaper editor asked him what kind of boy he was, to which Cooper replied, "I was obnoxious, disgusting, a real Eddie Haskell." However, the book ended up implying that Cooper was the genuine Eddie Haskell. "It was the biggest rumors about me that ever came out," Cooper would later tell the New Times. Finally, I got a T-shirt that read: 'I am not Eddie Haskell.' But people liked it."

Osmond had grown up to become adult film actor John Holmes, according to another well-known urban legend of the 1970s. According to reports, Osmond had embarked on such a career before fan magazines mistakenly announced that they did not. When a Los Angeles movie theater lit up the film "Eddie Haskell of television" in 'Behind the Green Door,' Osmond, then an LAPD cop, ordered him to go to the theater to demand that the manager have the name removed from the marquee, the rumors were dismissed. Osmond testified at his disability hearing in 1986 that he was called into LAPD Internal Affairs in 1971 and begged to disrobe to show he was not John Holmes.

Osmond pleaded guilty to "Le Sex Shoppe," an adult video starring Holmes in the early 1980s. "Little Eddie Haskell" was featured on the film, according to the video. "Leave it to Beaver," the film said.' Osmond said that the film's advertisements insulted him, but the trial court dismissed the suit, finding that there were no proof that the bookstore's owner was aware of the defamatory words on the packaging and therefore had not intervened with "mischief" in selling the film.

Osmond, together with Beaver co-stars Jerry Mathers, Richard Deacon, and Jeri Weil appeared on the Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour in 1983. In 1983, Osmond appeared in Still the Beaver, a CBS made-for-television film that followed the adult Cleaver boys, their families, and their families. The television film was a hit and culminated in the revival comedy series The New Leave It to Beaver, which premiered the following year. The show spanned four seasons from 1984 to 1989, beginning on The Disney Channel and later expanding to WTBS. Osmond played Eddie Haskell as a husband and father, while Osmond's two real-life sons, Eric Osmond and Christian Osmond, appeared as Freddie Haskell and Edward "Bomber" Haskell Jr., respectively.

The Young Artist Foundation's Former Child Star "Lifetime Achievement" Award in 1987 was given to Osmond for his work as Eddie Haskell. He continued to appear on television programs in the 1980s and 1990s, including the television series Happy Days and Rags to Riches, and the television show High School in the United States, as well as cameo appearances as Eddie Haskell on such television shows as Parker Lewis Can't Lose and Hi Honey, I'm Home! Eddie Haskell, Sr., was portrayed in the 1997 film Leave It to Beaver, and Adam Zolotin played his son Eddie Haskell, Jr. He appeared in the 2016 indie film Characterz.

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