Date of Death between 2006-01-01 and 2006-12-31 (Sorted by Popularity Ascending)
1. Bruno Kirby
Actor | City Slickers
Native New Yorker and Italianate Bruno Kirby tended towards assertive, pushy, streetwise characters and was armed with a highly distinctive scratchy tenor voice that complemented his slim eyes and droopy puss and accentuated his deadpan comedic instincts on film and TV. The well-regarded character ...
2. Chris Penn
Actor | Reservoir Dogs
Christopher Shannon Penn was born on October 10, 1965 in Los Angeles, California, the third son of actress Eileen Ryan (née Annucci) and director, actor, and writer Leo Penn. His siblings are musician Michael Penn and actor Sean Penn. His father was from a Lithuanian Jewish/Russian Jewish family, ...
3. Peter Boyle
Actor | Everybody Loves Raymond
A bold, blunt instrument of hatred and violence at the onset of his film career, Peter Boyle recoiled from that repugnant, politically incorrect "working class" image to eventually play gruff, gentler bears and even comedy monsters in a career that lasted four decades.
He was born on October 18, ...
4. Jack Warden
Actor | ...and justice for all.
Jack Warden was born John Warden Lebzelter, Jr. on September 18, 1920 in Newark, New Jersey, to Laura M. (Costello) and John Warden Lebzelter. His father was of German and Irish descent, and his mother was of Irish ancestry. Raised in Louisville, Kentucky, at the age of seventeen, young Jack ...
5. Shelley Winters
Actress | The Poseidon Adventure
Shelley Winters was born Shirley Schrift of very humble beginnings on August 18, 1920 (some sources list 1922) in East St. Louis, Illinois. Her mother, Rose Winter, was born in Missouri, to Austrian Jewish parents, and her father, Jonas Schrift, was an Austrian Jewish immigrant. She had one sibling...
6. Jack Palance
Actor | Shane
Jack Palance quite often exemplified evil incarnate on film, portraying some of the most intensely feral villains witnessed in 1950s westerns and melodrama. Enhanced by his tall, powerful build, icy voice, and piercing eyes, he earned two "Best Supporting Actor" nominations early in his career. It ...
7. Paul Gleason
Actor | The Breakfast Club
Character actor Paul Gleason was adept at playing tough guys and white collar sleazebags, making his film debut in Winter A-Go-Go (1965). He made a name for himself portraying these unlikeable characters. A native of Jersey City, New Jersey, Gleason studied extensively at the Actor's Studio in New ...
8. Don Knotts
Actor | The Andy Griffith Show
Don Knotts, the legendary television character actor, was born Jesse Donald Knotts on July 21, 1924 in Morgantown, West Virginia, to William Jesse Knotts and the former Elsie Luzetta Moore. He was the youngest of four sons in a family that had been in America since the 17th century.
His first stint ...
9. Robert Altman
Director | Gosford Park
Robert Altman was born on February 20th, 1925 in Kansas City, Missouri, to B.C. (an insurance salesman) and Helen Altman. He entered St. Peters Catholic school at the age six, and spent a short time at a Catholic high school. From there, he went to Rockhurst High School. It was then that he started...
10. Moira Shearer
Actress | The Red Shoes
Moira was born the daughter of Harold Charles King, a civil engineer, in Dunfermline, Scotland. She was educated at Dunfermline High School, Ndola in Zambia (formerly Northern Rhodesia) and Bearsden Academy, Scotland. She received her professional training at the Mayfair School and The Nicholas ...
11. Robert Earl Jones
Actor | Sleepaway Camp
Robert Earl Jones was born on February 3, 1910 in Senatobia, Mississippi, USA. He was an actor, known for Sleepaway Camp (1983), The Sting (1973) and Witness (1985). He was previously married to Ruth Connolly, Jumelle P. Jones and Ruth Williams. He died on September 7, 2006 in Englewood, New Jersey...
12. Darren McGavin
Actor | A Christmas Story
A remarkably seasoned actor of stage, screen and television, Darren McGavin has notched in excess of 200 performances; however, he is most fondly remembered by cult TV fans as heroic newspaper reporter Carl Kolchak in the classic but short-lived horror TV series Kolchak: The Night Stalker (1974). ...
13. Mako
Actor | Conan the Barbarian
Born in Japan, Makoto Iwamatsu was living there with his grandparents while his parents studied art in the United States, when Japan and the U.S. went to war in 1941. His parents remained in the U.S., working for the Office of War Information, and, at the cessation of the conflict, were granted U.S...
14. Dennis Weaver
Actor | Touch of Evil
Dennis Weaver first became familiar to television audiences as Matt Dillon's assistant Chester Goode in Gunsmoke (1955). After playing the part for nine years, he moved on to star in his own series, Kentucky Jones (1964). However, the show failed to find mass appeal and was cancelled after just one...
15. Glenn Ford
Actor | Gilda
Legendary actor Glenn Ford was born Gwyllyn Samuel Newton Ford in Sainte-Christine-d'Auvergne, Quebec, Canada, to Hannah Wood (Mitchell) and Newton Ford, a railroad executive. His family moved to Santa Monica, California when he was eight years old. His acting career began with plays at high school...
16. Kasey Rogers
Actress | Strangers on a Train
Kasey Rogers was born Josie Imogene Rogers in Morehouse, Missouri, to Ina Mae (Mocabee) and Eben Elijah Rogers. She moved with her family to California at age two and a half. She got the nickname "Casey" when her neighborhood playmates discovered how well she handled a baseball bat ("I could hit a ...
17. Tony Jay
Actor | The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Tony Jay was a British actor and narrator. He is known for his deep and distinctive British voice. He was well-known for voicing Claude Frollo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Megabyte from ReBoot, Monsieur D'Arque from Beauty and the Beast, Shere Khan from The Jungle Book 2, Magneto in X-Men ...
18. Barnard Hughes
Actor | The Lost Boys
Emmy and Tony Award-winner Barnard Hughes forged a career as one of American's most successful character actors, equally at home and successful on stage, the silver screen, and television. Most of his success came after middle-age. He made his Broadway debut in 1939 in Mary McCarthy's "Please, Mrs....
19. Al Lewis
Actor | Super Scary Saturday
In the late 1920s, Lewis worked as a circus performer, but ultimately decided on college, earning a Ph.D. in child psychology from Columbia University. He taught school and wrote two children's books. In 1949, at the suggestion of a friend, Lewis turned to acting and joined the Paul Mann Actor's ...
20. Edward Albert
Actor | Butterflies Are Free
The only son of Green Acres (1965) star Eddie Albert and Mexican actress/dancer Margo, Edward Laurence Albert managed to come out from under his father's strong shadow and make a gallant showing of his own as a gifted thespian. Born in Los Angeles on February 20, 1951, Edward's multi-cultural ...
21. Richard Bright
Actor | The Godfather Part III
Fair complexioned, cold-eyed actor Richard Bright notched up an impressive array of character performances of often shifty, or deadly characters on the wrong side of the law. He first came to attention as a burglar in the engrossing The Panic in Needle Park (1971), and then followed it the ...
22. Jack Wild
Actor | Oliver!
Born September 30, 1952, in Royton, near Oldham, England, Jack Wild was discovered by talent agent June Collins, mother of rock star Phil Collins. His breakthrough came when he landed the role of Oliver in the London stage production of "Oliver!" When it came to casting the film, the role of the ...
23. Robert Donner
Actor | High Plains Drifter
Robert Donner was born in New York City and grew up in New Jersey, Michigan and Texas. Robert joined the Navy after he graduated from high school and served almost 4 years. After he left the Navy he stayed on the West Coast and worked as a shipping clerk, salesman, bartender, commercial artist, ...
24. June Allyson
Actress | Executive Suite
American leading lady whose sweet smile and sunny disposition made her the prototypical girl-next-door of American movies of the 1940s. Raised in semi-poverty in Bronx neighborhoods by her divorced mother, Allyson (nee Ella Geisman) was injured in a fall at age eight and spent four years confined ...
25. Andreas Katsulas
Actor | Babylon 5
Born in St. Louis, Missouri, Andreas from a working-class Greek-American family. Attracted from early childhood to being on stage when at 4 his mother took him to see a community theater performance, he took theatre as an extra-curricular activity in high school. He then majored in it at St. Louis ...
26. Alida Valli
Actress | The Third Man
Enigmatic, dark-haired foreign import Alida Valli was dubbed "The Next Garbo" but didn't live up to postwar expectations despite her cool, patrician beauty, remote allure and significant talent. Born in Pola, Italy (now Croatia), on May 3, 1921, the daughter of a Tridentine journalist and professor...
27. Maureen Stapleton
Actress | Reds
Academy Award-winner Maureen Stapleton was born June 21, 1925 in Troy, New York, to Irene (née Walsh) and John P. Stapleton. Her family was of Irish descent. Maureen moved to New York City at the age of eighteen and did modeling to pay the bills. Already a Tony Award-winner, she made her Academy ...
28. Mickey Hargitay
Actor | Gli amori di Ercole
Mickey Hargitay was born on January 6, 1926 in Budapest, Hungary. He was an actor, known for The Loves of Hercules (1960), Delirio caldo (1972) and Bloody Pit of Horror (1965). He was previously married to Ellen Hargitay, Jayne Mansfield and Mary Birge. He died on September 14, 2006 in Los Angeles,...
29. Michael Taliferro
Actor | Life
Michael Taliferro was born on August 23, 1961 in Fort Worth, Texas, USA. He was an actor and director, known for Life (1999), The Replacements (2000) and Bad Boys (1995). He died on May 4, 2006 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
30. Moose
Actor | My Dog Skip
Moose was the youngest of a litter of four, yet was also the biggest, hence his name. Hyper and destructive as a pup, he eventually found his way to Birds & Animals Unlimited, where he got his job playing Eddie on 'Frasier', before going on to act in the film My Dog Skip (2000), along with his son,...
31. Jeremy Slate
Actor | True Grit
Born by the Atlantic Ocean, Jeremy Slate also had a Pacific Ocean view when he lived in Malibu, California. In between oceans he has traveled the world.
He attended a military academy, joined the US Navy at 16 and was barely 18 when his destroyer joined the invasion of Normandy on D-Day (June 6, ...
32. Adrienne Shelly
Actress | Waitress
The late Adrienne Shelly was born in Queens, New York, to Elaine Langbaum and Sheldon Levine. After graduating Jericho High School in Jericho, New York, she enrolled at Boston University and majored in film production. She dropped out after her junior year and moved to Manhattan, where she made a ...
33. Jane Wyatt
Actress | Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
Born in Campgaw, New Jersey, Jane Waddington Wyatt came from a New York family of social distinction (her father was a Wall Street investment banker and her mother was a drama critic). Jane was raised from the age of three months in New York City and attended the fashionable Chapin School and later...
34. Joseph Barbera
Producer | ABC Afterschool Specials
Joseph Roland Barbera was an American animator, film director, and television producer. He was the co-founder of the company Hanna-Barbera, with his longtime partner William Hanna.
Barbera was born in an Italian-American family. His parents were barbershop-owner Vincent Barbera (1889-1965) and ...
35. Red Buttons
Actor | The Poseidon Adventure
Although Red Buttons is best known as a stand-up comic, he is also a successful songwriter, an Academy Award-winning actor (and has been nominated for two Golden Globe awards) and an accomplished singer. Born Aaron Chwatt in New York City's Lower East Side, Buttons (who got his name from a uniform ...
36. Osa Massen
Actress | Rocketship X-M
Osa Massen (born Aase Madsen Iversen) was a newspaper photographer with an ambition to become a film editor. Prolific Danish film director Alice O'Fredericks gave her a role in her film Kidnapped (1935). After only two films in Denmark, she was given a screen test by 20th Century Fox and arrived in...
37. Tanis Chandler
Actress | Shadows Over Chinatown
Tanis Chandler was born in Nantes, France on August 20, 1924. Her real name (and birth-name) is Tanis Anne Goldthwaite and she is the daughter of composer/soloist Chandler Goldthwaite. Her early education was at the Chateau de Bure school in Paris, Saint Joseph's in Arizona and The Westlake School ...
38. Aaron Spelling
Producer | Charlie's Angels
Aaron Spelling graduated from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, with a Bachelor of Arts Degree. Before that, he attended Forest Avenue High. He started as a writer and sold his first script to Jane Wyman Presents the Fireside Theatre (1955). He wrote for various television shows, ...
39. James Brown
Actor | The Blues Brothers
James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 - December 25, 2006) was an American singer, dancer, musician, record producer, and bandleader. The central progenitor of funk music and a major figure of 20th century music, he is often referred to by the honorific nicknames "Godfather of Soul", "Mr. Dynamite", and ...
40. Anthony Franciosa
Actor | A Hatful of Rain
Franciosa was born Anthony Papaleo on October 25, 1928, in New York City. The son of a construction worker and seamstress who divorced when he was a year old, he seldom saw his father after this and never man really got to know the other. After graduating high school, during a visit to a YMCA to ...
41. Dana Reeve
Actress | Everyone's Hero
Dana Reeve was born on March 17, 1961 in Teaneck, New Jersey, USA. She was an actress and producer, known for Everyone's Hero (2006), Oz (1997) and Loving (1983). She was previously married to Christopher Reeve. She died on March 6, 2006 in Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA.
42. Mike Evans
Writer | Good Times
Clean cut and smoothly handsome as a youth, Mike Evans got on board the Norman Lear TV train in the early 1970s and took a straight ride to sitcom stardom in both a landmark comedy series and its black-oriented spin-off. Born Michael Jonas Evans in Salisbury, North Carolina, on November 3, 1949, ...
43. Elizabeth Allen
Actress | Donovan's Reef
Elizabeth Allen was born on January 25, 1929 in Jersey City, New Jersey, USA. She was an actress, known for Donovan's Reef (1963), The Carey Treatment (1972) and The Fugitive (1963). She was previously married to Baron Karl von Vietinghoff-Scheel. She died on September 19, 2006 in Fishkill, New ...
44. Tom Bell
Actor | The L-Shaped Room
Tom Bell was one of the UK's finest actors but he never achieved the star billing or recognition he so richly deserved. His career spanned some 50 years. Time and time again, Bell gave memorable performances. From the able seaman ordered to be flogged by a sadistic officer, played by Dirk Bogarde, ...
45. Virginia Vale
Actress | Blonde Comet
Virginia Vale was born on May 20, 1920 in Dallas, Texas, USA. She was an actress, known for Blonde Comet (1941), Triple Justice (1940) and Broadway Big Shot (1942). She died on September 14, 2006 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
46. Richard Fleischer
Director | Soylent Green
Richard firmly established his credentials with such epics as The Vikings (1958) , 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954) and Barabbas (1961) and also proved to be a master of intimate drama with Compulsion (1959) , which won Cannes Festival awards for it's male stars. He won an Academy Award for one ...
47. Paul Carr
Actor | Akira
Paul Carr was born on February 1, 1934 in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA. He was an actor and producer, known for Akira (1988), Star Trek (1966) and The Time Tunnel (1966). He was previously married to Merrily M Hirsch and Evan MacNeil. He died on February 17, 2006 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
48. Frank Middlemass
Actor | Barry Lyndon
Frank Middlemass, the son of a naval architect, was born in Eaglescliffe, near Stockton. He made his stage debut at the Newcastle Upon Tyne Playhouse in Jesmond after the war then performed in repertory in Penzance and later at London's Old Vic, Bristol, and on a world tour. . He appeared in a ...
49. Arthur Franz
Actor | The Caine Mutiny
Arthur Scofield Franz was born in Perth Amboy, NJ, to Dorothy and Gustav Franz, German immigrants. He was a reliable character actor in many 1940s and 1950s "B" pictures, often cast as a friendly small-town businessman or professional (as in The Doctor and the Girl (1949)) or the lead's sympathetic...
50. Amzie Strickland
Actress | Pretty Woman
Amzie Strickland was born on January 10, 1919 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA. She was an actress, known for Pretty Woman (1990), Doc Hollywood (1991) and Matinee Theatre (1955). She was previously married to Frank Behrens. She died on July 5, 2006 in Spokane, Washington, USA.