Hackett goes against type as the seemingly nice but ultimately ruthless Malakie, sporting a beard and an attitude about as different from his usual goofball characters as could be. Hackett’s character, Daniel Malakie, breaks his two surviving sons out of jail and vows to get revenge against Lucas. When Marshal Torrance and Lucas McCain arrive to restore order, one of the cowboys accidentally shoots his brother and blames it on Lucas. In “Bloodlines,” Hackett played the father of three rowdy young men who trash the North Fork saloon. One such part was in a 1959 episode of The Rifleman, his first of two appearances on the classic western. In later years, Buddy and his wife, Sherry, were dedicated to the rescue of unwanted dogs and cats, creating a nonprofit animal refuge called “Buddy Hackett’s Singita.” Its annual fundraiser, the Singita Comedy Spectacular, premiered at Disney’s El Capitan Theatre in 2002.īuddy Hackett passed away on June 30, 2003, in Malibu, California.Comedian Buddy Hackett, hilarious star of favorites like It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and The Music Man, never shied away from the occasional dramatic role. Two years later, he starred in the Disney television special The Grand Opening of Walt Disney World and, in 1992, lent his voice to the character Louie in Disney’s Dinosaurs series, which aired on ABC.įollowing the splashing success of The Little Mermaid in 1989, Buddy returned as the voice of Scuttle in the 2000 direct-to-video feature The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea.” Later, he played Hollywood comedian Lou Costello in the 1978 television film Bud and Lou.īuddy first arrived at Disney to star in The Love Bug with Dean Jones and Michele Lee the film became the highest-grossing motion picture in the United States in 1969. In 1958, he replaced Art Carney for two years as a regular cast member on The Jackie Gleason Show. In 1988, he joined funny man Bill Murray in the comedy Scrooged, a modern take on Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.ĭuring the 1950s, he entered television, starring in a number of series including his own sitcom, Stanley, with Carol Burnett. He went on to become a popular headliner in comedy clubs across the country, which led to a starring role in the hit road production of Call Me Mister and, later, his Hollywood debut in the 1953 motion picture Walking My Baby Back Home, starring Donald O’Connor.īuddy went on to star in a number of motion pictures, including the drama God’s Little Acre starring Robert Ryan in 1958, The Music Man starring Robert Preston in 1962, and the all-star comedy It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World in 1963, among others. I wanted attention and I got it by being funny.”Įntering the work force as an apprentice upholsterer to his father, Buddy quickly made a break for show business, working as a waiter-entertainer in the “borscht circuit” of the Catskill Mountains. As he explained, “I was a poor kid we didn’t have the material things. He learned to make people laugh while growing up in Brooklyn, New York. “His readings were just so funny it gave us a real handle on the character and something great to work with.”īorn Leonard Hacker on August 31, 1924, Buddy was a gentle man with a huge heart off-camera. “We tried to put Buddy’s sort of cross-eyed look and side-of-the-mouth delivery into the character,” said Stephan. He certainly left his comedic mark at Disney, on such smash hit feature films as The Love Bug, in which he played the wacky, mystic sculptor Tennessee Steinmetz, and The Little Mermaid, in which he provided the voice of Scuttle, the daft seagull who’s always showing off his false knowledge about humans.īuddy’s wide range of facial expressions and his distinctive voice served as inspiration to animator Dave Stephan. Actor and comedian Buddy Hackett has been called one of America’s funniest and most inventive comics.
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