Sunday, March 30, 2014

ACTOR/COMEDIAN DAVE MADDEN (1931 - 2014)


Actor/comedian Dave Madden died some weeks ago and your opinionated narrator had every intention to post a personal perspective on the man. ("I will... in a minute. I told you I'll clean up my room.")

Sorry for the delay. January 16th was over two months ago.

The actor best known for playing the role of Reuben Kincaid on the 1970s television program The Partridge Family, was born in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada, but like many Canadians and "Canadian-born" folk, eventually ended up on U.S. television screens.

Last year I went through some bits and pieces of the old skit TV series Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, and during a bounce-around segment, typical of the show, whammo!: "Hey, it's Dave Madden!" There was that sombre hard-done-by persona which he rendered so well in The Partridge Family.

Apparently he was a genuinely nice man: During production of Partridge Family, Madden sometimes took-in Danny Bonaduce under his wing when things were tough at home for the young actor.

Before The Partridge Family and Laugh-In, was Camp Runamuck. I first heard of that series years ago when a coworker told me about a favourite show from his childhood. Dave Madden was one of the leads in that short-lived half-hour comedy (1965-1966).

I had forgotten that he was "Earl Hicks" in the truly terrible sitcom, Alice, which ran from 1976 to 1985. (It ran for how long?) Back in 1991, the CBC re-ran the series and it was then that I actually watched a few episodes at random. I think the current expression would be: O... M... G....

Having said that, I would not be surprised if some fans of Alice were to say that the character of Earl Hicks was one of the reasons to watch.

After looking over the actor's list of credits, which I had to do since I stopped being a regular "tv watcher" in my mid-late teens, I became aware that Dave Madden was a busy actor, guest starring in many television programs throughout his long career.

Note: Madden died on the same day as actor Russell Johnson (whom I posted about here).


Wikipedia...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Madden

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