Ned Beatty

Ned Thomas Beatty was born on July 6, 1937, in Louisville, Kentucky, to Margaret (née Fortney) and Charles William Beatty, and had an older sister, Mary. He began singing in gospel and barbershop quartets in St. Matthews, Kentucky, in 1947, and later received a scholarship to sing in the a cappella choir at Transylvania University in Lexington, Kentucky, which he attended but did not complete. His stage debut came in 1956 at age 19, when he appeared in Wilderness Road, an outdoor historical pageant in Berea, Kentucky. Over the following decade he worked at Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Virginia — the State Theatre of Virginia — before returning to Kentucky to work at the Clarksville Little Theater in Indiana and the newly founded Actors Theater of Louisville, where he played Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman in 1966.

Beatty's Broadway career ran from 1968 to 2003 and included appearances in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, the musical Show Boat, and The Great White Hope. He received the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play in 2004. His stage work formed the foundation of a performing career that ultimately spanned five decades and encompassed more than 160 film and television roles.

His film debut came in 1972 when he was cast as Bobby Trippe in Deliverance, opposite Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds, a film set in northern Georgia that became the fifth highest-grossing release of that year. He followed that with roles in The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean alongside Paul Newman, and in 1973 appeared in The Thief Who Came to Dinner, The Last American Hero, and White Lightning, the last of which reunited him with Burt Reynolds. His television work during this period included an episode of The Waltons and The Marcus-Nelson Murders, the pilot for the series Kojak. In 1975 he appeared in Robert Altman's Nashville and in W.W. and the Dixie Dancekings, and took the role of Colonel Hollister in an episode of M*A*S*H.

Beatty received his only Academy Award nomination, for Best Supporting Actor, for his portrayal of a television network's chairman of the board in Network (1976). The same film swept three of the four acting categories at that year's Academy Awards, with wins for Peter Finch, Faye Dunaway, and Beatrice Straight, while the Best Supporting Actor award went to Jason Robards for All the President's Men, a film in which Beatty also appeared. Also in 1976, Beatty was cast by Richard Donner to play Lex Luthor's henchman Otis in Superman (1978), a role he reprised in Superman II (1980). He received his first Emmy nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Special for Friendly Fire (1979), and during 1977 and 1978 starred in the short-lived CBS sitcom Szysznyk.

Throughout the 1980s Beatty maintained a prolific output across both film and television. He appeared in Hopscotch (1980) with Walter Matthau, The Incredible Shrinking Woman (1981) directed by Joel Schumacher, and The Toy (1982) with Richard Pryor and Richard Donner. He played a corrupt police officer in the neo-noir film The Big Easy (1987) alongside Dennis Quaid, and appeared opposite Michael Caine and Pierce Brosnan in the spy drama The Fourth Protocol (1987). He took the role of the academic Dean Martin in Back to School (1986) with Rodney Dangerfield, and beginning in 1989 had a recurring role as the father of John Goodman's character on the television comedy series Roseanne, which continued through 1994.

Entering the 1990s, Beatty earned a third Emmy nomination, for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Special, for Last Train Home (1990). His portrayal of tenor Josef Locke in the British film Hear My Song (1991) brought him a Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He appeared in Rudy (1993), based on a true story set at Notre Dame, and starred as Detective Stanley Bolander in the NBC drama Homicide: Life on the Street for its first three seasons from 1993 to 1995. He also provided voice performances in Toy Story 3 (2010) and Rango (2011). Beatty was additionally nominated for two Emmy Awards, an MTV Movie Award for Best Villain, and a Golden Globe Award over the course of his career. He died on June 13, 2021.