Liam Sullivan

Liam Sullivan (May 18, 1923 – April 19, 1998) was an American actor born William Edward Sullivan in Jacksonville, Illinois, to Lee A. Sullivan (1889–1968) and Nell Sullivan, née Griffiths (1891–1957). He attended Jacksonville High School, where he first became involved in acting, and later pursued the craft as a student at Illinois College before continuing his theatrical training at Harvard University.

Sullivan's Broadway career spanned from 1951 to 1967, with credits including The Little Foxes, Love's Labor Lost, and The Constant Wife. He made his Broadway debut in 1951 in The Constant Nymph. Shortly before his death, he completed a role in Mike Nichols's production of The Little Foxes.

Although Sullivan maintained a presence on Broadway, the bulk of his professional work unfolded on television. In the mid-1950s he appeared on the religious anthology series Crossroads. Between 1961 and 1962, he made three guest appearances on Perry Mason, portraying the murder victim in each, including the 1962 episode "The Case of the Unsuitable Uncle." His television work extended across a wide range of genres and programs. He portrayed Patrick Henry in the Daniel Boone episode "Love and Equity," played scientist Anthony Sterling in the Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea episode "Leviathan," and took on the role of Nexus in the Lost in Space episode "His Majesty Smith." He appeared as an army lieutenant in the Rawhide episode "The Winter Soldier," as Mr. Willis in Knots Landing, as Dr. Burt Hammond in St. Elsewhere, and as Mr. Plenn in Falcon Crest.

Sullivan appeared in two notable episodes of The Twilight Zone. In "The Silence," a second-season episode that aired in 1961, he played a talkative young member of a gentleman's club who accepts an unusual wager from an older member portrayed by Franchot Tone, a bet that concludes with unintended consequences. In "The Changing of the Guard," a third-season episode from 1962, he played the headmaster of a private boarding school who must inform a long-serving teacher, played by Donald Pleasence, that his time at the institution has come to an end.

In 1966, Sullivan guest starred opposite William Shatner on Gunsmoke, playing Benjamin Ellis, a Quaker compelled to shelter a gunman, in the episode "Quaker Girl." Two years later he reunited with Shatner in the Star Trek episode "Plato's Stepchildren," portraying Parmen, a telekinetic alien described in the episode as arrogant and cruel. Also in 1966, he appeared as Terrence O'Toole in the Bonanza episode "The Dublin Lad," and during the 1966–67 season he was featured as Major Mapoy in all twenty-six episodes of the ABC Western series The Monroes, which starred Michael Anderson, Jr., and Barbara Hershey. He played the prosecuting attorney in the Combat! episode "Hill 256" and appeared in the Dragnet episode "The Big Prophet" in 1968, in which his character, Brother William, a figure modeled on Timothy Leary, spent the episode advocating for LSD and marijuana while Joe Friday argued against him. Sullivan played a comparable character — a con artist and cult leader — in a 1970 episode of Adam 12. He also appeared as Dr. Tolvar in the 1976 Hawaii Five-0 episode "The Capsule Kidnapping."

Sullivan's film credits include the role of Graham in That Darn Cat! (1965) and an appearance in The Magic Sword (1962). In 1977, he participated in the documentary The Amazing World of Psychic Phenomena, hosted by Raymond Burr, in which he took part in experiments related to telepathy.

At the time of his death, Sullivan was working on two books: a novel and a history of his family's Eli Bridge Co., which was credited with constructing one of the first Ferris wheels. He died on April 19, 1998, in Los Angeles of a heart attack at the age of 74, and was interred at Diamond Grove Cemetery in his native Jacksonville, Illinois.