Herbert Rudley

Herbert Rudley (March 22, 1910 – September 9, 2006) was an American actor and playwright born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, whose career spanned stage, film, and television across more than five decades. After attending Temple University, he left to accept a scholarship to Eva Le Gallienne's Civic Repertory Theatre, where he studied for six months before transitioning into professional performance with the same company. He remained with the Repertory Theatre for the better part of three seasons.

Rudley made his first stage appearance in 1926 and arrived on Broadway in 1931 with Did I Say No. His subsequent Broadway credits included We, the People (1932), The Threepenny Opera (1932), The Eternal Road (1936), Battle Hymn (1935), Mother (1935), Another Sun (1939), The World We Make (1939), Eight O'Clock Tuesday (1940), Macbeth (1941), Sons and Soldiers (1942), and How Long Till Summer (1949). He also appeared in Abe Lincoln in Illinois on stage. In addition to performing, Rudley worked as a playwright, authoring Shadow on the Wall and co-writing the farce Adam Ate the Apple with Fanya Lawrence. In the mid-1940s, he partnered with Keenan Wynn to establish Players Production, a small Los Angeles theater company dedicated to presenting play revivals.

His film career began in earnest with the 1940 screen adaptation of Abe Lincoln in Illinois. Over the following four decades he took on supporting roles in numerous productions, among them The Seventh Cross (1944), Rhapsody in Blue (1945) — in which he portrayed Ira Gershwin in the fictionalized biography of George Gershwin — A Walk in the Sun (1945), Joan of Arc (1948), and The Young Lions (1958). In Decoy he played a doctor who revives a convict believed to have been executed, and in The Black Sleep he portrayed a doctor who is himself nearly executed before being resuscitated by Basil Rathbone.

On television, Rudley appeared frequently in both dramatic and comedic roles, often cast as military figures. He made seven appearances on the CBS series You Are There, hosted by Walter Cronkite, and guest starred on My Friend Flicka. In 1956 he played Emmett Eagan in the Gunsmoke episode "The Man Who Would Be Marshal" (Season 2, Episode 37), a role he reprised the following year. In 1957 he also joined the early episodes of NBC's western drama The Californians as Sam Brennan, set against the San Francisco gold rush of the 1850s. That same year he appeared as Col. Sam Percy on Maverick and as John McAuliffe on Border Patrol in 1959. He made two guest appearances as Jeremy Thorne in NBC's western series Laramie.

Rudley made four appearances on Perry Mason between 1958 and 1962, including the role of murderer George Durrell in the 1958 episode "The Case of the Prodigal Parent" and Edward Nelson in the 1960 episode "The Case of the Gallant Grafter." He was among only eleven actors to portray all three pivotal roles — victim, defendant, and murderer — across different Perry Mason episodes. In 1960–61 he co-starred in the NBC drama Michael Shayne alongside Richard Denning, and from 1965 to 1966 he appeared in the NBC comedy Mona McCluskey with Juliet Prowse. In 1963 he made two appearances on The Beverly Hillbillies and played an overbearing father in the Leave It to Beaver episode "The All-Night Party." From 1967 through 1969 he co-starred as Herb Hubbard for two seasons on NBC's The Mothers-in-Law, featuring Eve Arden and Kaye Ballard. In 1973 he guest starred in an episode of Griff, and in 1981 he made four appearances on Dallas as Howard Barker, an attorney representing J.R. Ewing in divorce and child custody proceedings against Sue Ellen.

Rudley was first married to Ann Loring, with whom he had a son, Stephen. During the 1970s he owned and operated a small gift shop in the Marina Del Rey shopping mall. He died in Los Angeles on September 9, 2006, at the age of 96, from a heart attack.