Alan Bunce

Alan Coe Bunce (June 28, 1900 – April 27, 1965) was an American actor whose career spanned Broadway, radio, and television across four decades. Born in Westfield, New Jersey, he was the youngest of three children of Theodore Dwight Bunce, an inventor, and Alice Edwards Bunce, who died while Bunce was still a young boy. His birth year was long disputed, with various sources citing 1902, 1903, and 1908, but family papers published in 2008 by his grandson Andrew Bunce confirmed June 28, 1900, a date consistent with his U.S. World War I Draft Registration Card and his recorded age of 39 in the 1940 U.S. Census. Bunce graduated from a high school in Melrose, Massachusetts, in 1918.

His Broadway career extended from 1922 to 1961 and included productions such as The Perfect Alibi, Unexpected Husband, the musical Copper and Brass, A Cook for Mr. General, and The Golden Journey. Among his stage roles, he portrayed New York State Governor Al Smith in Sunrise at Campobello, a drama centered on Franklin Delano Roosevelt's early struggle with polio and his return to public life during the 1924 Democratic National Convention, at which Roosevelt walked to the podium to nominate Smith for president.

Bunce's work in radio began in the early 1930s with small roles and guest appearances. In 1939 he joined the medical drama Young Doctor Malone, becoming the first actor to play Dr. Jerry Malone, a physician serving the community of Three Oaks. He remained with the program until 1944. That same year he succeeded film actor Richard Widmark in the role of Albert Arbuckle on Peg Lynch's radio sitcom Ethel and Albert, in which Lynch played Albert's wife Ethel. Bunce stayed with the program for its full six-year radio run, from 1944 to 1950.

The Ethel and Albert characters transitioned to television beginning with appearances on The Kate Smith Hour in 1952, leading to the premiere of the televised Ethel and Albert on NBC on April 25, 1953. The series moved to CBS on June 20, 1955, where it served as a summer replacement for December Bride before concluding its run on ABC between October 14, 1955, and July 6, 1956. Bunce had entered television earlier, with a guest appearance on the ABC anthology series The Clock in 1950.

Beyond his performing career, Bunce held leadership positions within broadcast labor organizations. He was a ranking officer in the American Federation of Radio Artists, which was formed in 1937, and in 1952 was elected the first president of the American Federation of Radio and Television Artists following its merger with the Television Authority, a position he held until 1954.

In his later years Bunce appeared in episodes of Perry Mason, The United States Steel Hour, The Patty Duke Show, and The Nurses. His final television appearance was in a 1965 episode of The Defenders. Bunce had married Ruth Elizabeth Nugent, an actress, in 1924. She was born in Ohio and was the daughter of John Charles Nugent, an actor, playwright, and Variety commentator, and the sister of actor Elliott Nugent. Bunce died on April 27, 1965, at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center at the age of 64 and is interred at Long Ridge Union Cemetery in Stamford, Connecticut.