William Schallert Dies

The actor who played Mrs Olsen's ex fiancé has died. He played the pastor who married Rev Alden and Anna.

Sorry to hear of William's passing. He was also in the Centennial episode. He played the guy from the tax office.

William Schallert, a familiar presence on prime-time television for decades, notably as the long-suffering father and uncle to the “identical cousins” played by Patty Duke on the hit 1960s sitcom “The Patty Duke Show,” died on Sunday in Pacific Palisades, Calif. He was 93.

Mr. Schallert’s career spanned generations and genres. Over more than 60 years he racked up scores of credits in episodic television as well as noteworthy performances in motion pictures, on the Off Broadway stage and as a voice-over artist.

With his preternaturally mature, intelligent but (by Hollywood standards) unremarkable looks, he was cast almost from the beginning as an authority figure — a father or a teacher, a doctor or a scientist, a mayor or a judge. Most active from the 1950s through the ’80s, Mr. Schallert remained seemingly unchanged in appearance and persona over time, and he was still working in his 90s, dismissing any thoughts of retirement.

On television it sometimes seemed as if he was everywhere. A versatile character actor with a comforting presence, he was equally at home in comedies and dramas, with a résumé ranging from “Leave It to Beaver,” “The Twilight Zone,” “Dr. Kildare” and “The Wild Wild West” to “Melrose Place,” “True Blood” and “Desperate Housewives.”

He appeared twice on Little House. The Preacher Takes a Wife as Dean Russell Harmon in 1979 and Centennial as Snell in 1976.

So sad...I remember him playing Patty Duke's father on The Patty Duke Show, and we just lost her the end of March.

I liked him a lot. He was a great actor. R.I.P.

Seemed like a nice man, too. He had this to say about Patty Duke:

Patty and I really bonded because I had four sons and she had no father. Her father had left the family when she was a little girl. He died while we were shooting the show. She came in one day and said “I heard today that my Daddy died,” but there was no real effect because she hardly knew him. It was very strange coming from her almost impersonally. I always called her the “daughter in my heart.”