Television and film actor, born in Morgantown, West Virginia, USA. His studies at West Virginia University were interrupted by World War 2 army service, where he entertained the troops, but he completed his degree in theatre studies in 1948. After working as a stand-up comedian, his break into showbusiness came with a regular spot on the Tonight Show, playing the type of nervous, highly-strung character that he continued to portray successfully for the rest of his career. He made many television and film appearances but is best remembered as the bumbling deputy Barney Fife (19605) in the long-running TV series The Andy Griffith Show, for which he won five Best Supporting Actor Emmy awards. During the 1970s his appeal began to fade, but he made a comeback on the sit-com Three's Company, playing would-be-swinger landlord Ralph Furley (197984). Later work included voiceovers for cartoons, notably the voice of Mayor Turkey Lurkey in the Disney animated film Chicken Little (2005).
Jesse Donald Knotts (July 21, 1924 – February 24, 2006) was an American comedic actor best known for his portrayal of Barney Fife on the 1960s television sitcom The Andy Griffith Show (a role which earned him five Emmy Awards), and as landlord Ralph Furley on the television sitcom Three's Company.
Biography
Early life
He was born in the university town Morgantown, West Virginia to Elsie L.
Knotts' father suffered from schizophrenia and alcoholism and died when Knotts was thirteen years old.
At 19 Knotts joined the Army and served in World War II as part of a traveling GI variety show called "Stars and Gripes."
Career
After being a regular performer in the soap opera Search for Tomorrow from 1953 to 1955, he gained additional exposure in 1956 on Steve Allen's variety show, appearing in Allen's mock "Man in the Street" interviews, always as a man obviously very nervous about being on camera.
Knotts's portrayal of a bumbling deputy sheriff on the very popular television sitcom The Andy Griffith Show was the role which earned him his greatest recognition.
After leaving the series in 1965, Knotts starred in a series of film comedies which drew on his high-strung persona from the TV series: The Incredible Mr. Limpet (1964), The Ghost and Mr. Chicken (1966), The Reluctant Astronaut (1967), The Shakiest Gun in the West (1968) and The Love God? (1969). He also appeared as Felix Unger in a stage version on Neil Simon's The Odd Couple with Art Carney as Oscar
In the 1970s, Knotts and Tim Conway starred together in a series of slapstick movies aimed at children, including the 1975 Disney film The Apple Dumpling Gang, and its 1979 sequel, The Apple Dumpling Gang Rides Again and the Disney movie "Herbie Goes To Monte Carlo".
Knotts returned to series television in the late 1970s, appearing as landlord Ralph Furley on Three's Company, after Audra Lindley and Norman Fell left the show to star in a short-lived spin-off series (The Ropers).
In 1998, Knotts had a small but pivotal role as the mysterious TV repairman in Pleasantville.
On September 12, 2003, Knotts was in Kansas City doing a stage version on On Golden Pond when he received a phone call from John Ritter's family telling him that his ex-Three's Company's co-star had died of an aortic dissection that day. Knotts himself had been the last Three's Company co-star to work with Ritter when he appeared in a cameo on an episode of the series Ritter was doing at the time of his death 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter in a episode that paid homage the famous TV series.
Death
Knotts died on February 24, 2006 at the UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles, California at the age of 81 from pulmonary and respiratory complications related to lung cancer. Wilkes said this about Knotts: "Only a genius like Knotts could make an anxiety-ridden, passive-aggressive Napoleon character like Fife a familiar, welcome friend each week. Without his awesome contributions to television there would've been no other over-the-top, self-deprecating acts like Conan O'Brien or Chris Farley."
Knotts is buried at Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles.
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