Talk:Fred Willard

message: this is kind of just a fan page - i don't have the energy to fix it - anyone else feel like it?
:It’s very disorganized, and doesn’t seem to follow a logical progression; for example, it states that he is notable for being in Everybody Loves Raymond, and then gives This is Spinal Tap as recent notable work… If someone had the knowledge and time, it might be worth breaking out the Chris Guset movies as a notable subsection, rather than a list of titles and character descriptions. Jock123 (talk) 09:04, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: - The KMI alumni page says he graduated in 1951. http://www.kmialumni.org/Fred_Willard.html This page includes a story from a fellow KMI graduate who spoke with Fred Willard and gives the 1951 date. The Virginia Military Institute says he graduated from there in 1955.  (VMI is equivalent to a standard college program so presumably the vast majority of it's students start at approximately 18 and graduate at approximately 22, like any college.) This VMI publication says that Fred Willard is a member of the Class of '55. http://www.vmikeydets.com/articles/artfiles/71240_VMI_&_Facilities_History.pdf  It hardly seems credible that he graduated from VMI at the age of 16.  HIs academic arc totally supports a birthdate much earlier than 1939.Kentucho 15:10, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Untitled

message: According to info from BotCon 2008, Willard is set to voice the Decepticon Swindle in Transformers Animated. --75.181.69.137 (talk) 18:52, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Transformers 

message: Fred appeared with the Sid and Marty Krofft puppets in syndicated series "D.C. Follies" from 1987-89.  He was the only live regular on the show.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.217.44.78 (talk) 22:37, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fred Willard was bartender in syndicated TV show D.C. Follies 

message: IMDb is not a reliable source. What it says on the matter is meaningless for our purposes. This is also the case for NNDB.
When he graduated from whatever school tells us one thing and one thing only about his date of birth, it was before the graduation date. Making assumptions about how old he may have been when he graduated and doing some math to arrive at a purported birth date is original research.
Long story short, until we have a reliable source that gives his birth date, we have nothing to discuss on the topic. - SummerPhD (talk) 18:54, 10 June 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, we do have sources normally considered "reliable" in other entertainment-related articles, eg . There is no apparent dispute over the date of birth, only the year. Gimmetrow 19:19, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

text: The Los Angeles Times, a reliable source, on July 6 gave his age as 72: http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/tv/showtracker/la-et-st-fred-willard-20120707,0,5324527.story .--Tenebrae (talk) 20:50, 19 July 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: HOWEVER, Susan King, the article's writer, e-mailed me back (as a professional courtesy to a fellow journalist) to say that she relied on IMDb, so scratch that. Perhaps TheSmokingGun.com will post the arrest report, which theoretically would have his age? --Tenebrae (talk) 21:36, 19 July 2012 (UTC)

text: I don't think we should be guessing or trying to figure it out at all.  It seems to me that doing so would fall into the category of original research which we aren't supposed to be adding into articles.  Unless we can find a reliable source (imdb and TMZ aren't reliable sources, I see they were mentioned above), his birth date shouldn't be guessed or figured out, in my opinion. -- WV ● ✉ ✓  17:27, 13 January 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Date of birth/age 

message: "He auditioned alongside Robert Klein for The Second City, which consisted of a nightclub manager and his employee." What consisted of a nightclub manager and his employee? The # of employees at Second City at the time? The roles they were given for their audition? Kingturtle (talk) 15:41, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  please clarify the sentence... 

message: I see a Fred Willard playing a rookie agent in Get Samrt's fourth season. Is this him?
84.229.109.116 (talk) 18:32, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes. -- megA (talk) 15:29, 16 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Get Smart (1969?) 

message: From 1963 to 1968, according to imdb, he appeared together with Vic Greco as comedy duo "Vic Grecco and Fred Willard", for example on Ed Sullivan's "Toast of the Town" and other shows, until a final joint appearance in "Get Smart" as two rookie agents. (Vic Greco seems to have disappeared from showbiz shortly afterwards.) This seems to have been his TV or even his showbiz debut before Second City, so I think it should be mentioned. I can't find any stage appearances. Anyone know more? -- megA (talk) 15:35, 16 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Comedy duo with Vic Grec(c)o (1963-1968??) 

message: Do we really need to see four pictures of him from the last three years?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.198.211.245 (talk) 03:52, 12 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pictures 

message: Willard was in the Ace Trucking Company improv comedy group, but the link in the article is not to that group, although they are mentioned in that article.  Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 17:08, 11 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ace Trucking Company 

message: The article claims "He graduated college from the Virginia Military Institute in 1955". I'm not sure how reliable this source is, but it supports this claim, saying that this degree was a "bachelor's degree in English" and that he was born in 1938.  This implies that he earned a bachelor's degree before 18 years of age? This seems unlikely. Justin W Smith (talk) 03:51, 20 July 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  1938 Year of birth? 

message: There is information in the (recently released) 1940 census data showing the family of a "Fred Willard" with a 6 year old child named "Frederick".  This may be consistent with a 1933 birth year.  This data can be seen through ancestry.com.
Name:	Fred C Willard
Age:	38
Estimated Birth Year:	abt 1902
Gender:	Male
Race:	White
Birthplace:	Ohio
Marital Status:	Married
Relation to Head of House:	Head
Home in 1940:	Shaker Heights, Cuyahoga, Ohio
View Map
Street:	Riedham Road
House Number:	Down 3571
Farm:	No
Inferred Residence in 1935:	Shaker Heights, Cuyahoga, Ohio
Residence in 1935:	Same Place
Resident on farm in 1935:	No
Sheet Number:	8B
Number of Household in Order of Visitation:	196
Household Members:	
Name	Age
Fred C Willard	38
Ruth Willard	38
Frederick Willard	6
I should also include the "source" information provided by ancestry.com: 
Source Citation: Year: 1940; Census Place: Shaker Heights, Cuyahoga, Ohio; Roll: T627_3058; Page: 8B; Enumeration District: 18-287.
(Thanks to User:Boppy1942 for the pointer.)
Justin W Smith (talk) 17:17, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  1940 Census Data 

message: The mobile version of this page (en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Willard) shows a different birth year (1938 rather than 1933). I understand there's some disagreement regarding his birth year, but really the reason I'm pointing this out is because it's strange that there's a difference between the two versions at all. If this is a commonality between mobile and desktop pages, I apologize for my amateurishness. I've just never come across this before now, haha. ⚓ nbmatt 06:45, 7 April 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Birthdate inconsistency between mobile and desktop Wikipedia page 

message: One minor error. He is credited as playing Pierce Hawthorne in his guest appearance of Community. Im pretty sure that was Chevy's part wasnt it?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.31.242.174 (talk) 15:41, 23 March 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Television Credit Error 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just added archive links to  on Fred Willard. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add  after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add  to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/20110629234916/http://www.rifftrax.com:80/rifftrax/category/classic-b-movies/missile-moon-vod to http://www.rifftrax.com/rifftrax/category/classic-b-movies/missile-moon-vod
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/20120930171011/http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/sns-rt-us-familytree-castbre88p1rh-20120926,0,1107198.story to http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/sns-rt-us-familytree-castbre88p1rh-20120926,0,1107198.story
When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.
Cheers. —cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 21:39, 17 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Fred Willard stars with Jeffrey Tambor in TV spots for Direct TV late-2015. In typical Willard style the ads are hilarious with off-the-wall gags like bringing "peel-and-eat shrimp" for the board meeting brunch.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.115.238.102 (talk) 05:09, 22 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Direct TV: Cable Corp merges with Cable World 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just added archive links to  on Fred Willard. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add  after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add  to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/20120720053044/http://www.emmys.com/nominations/2010/Outstanding%20Guest%20Actor%20In%20A%20Comedy%20Series to http://www.emmys.com/nominations/2010/Outstanding%20Guest%20Actor%20In%20A%20Comedy%20Series
When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.
Cheers.—cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 14:45, 5 January 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Fred Willard was also in The Perfect Woman (1981), a TV movie. That should be in his filmography or TV-ography. Felicity4711 (talk) 22:24, 31 March 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  ''The Perfect Woman'' (1981) 

message: Mr Willard was a co-host on an episode "Missile to the Moon" of RiffTrax (Mystery Science Theater 3000) in 2007 https://rifftrax.fandom.com/wiki/Fred_Willard  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.152.37.108 (talk) 02:03, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rifftrax 

message: I have deleted the "Charity work" section for lack of appropriate sourcing. Describing it as "considerable, ongoing dedication" without third-party sourcing drifts into the direction of MOS:PUFF. My non-exhaustive search for references turned up this and this. More third-party coverage than my limited search would be needed to build a sound section. BiologicalMe (talk) 14:48, 19 April 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: We don't bury things that were well covered in reliable sources. Given that it cost him a job with PBS, it is not trivial. See the due weight policy. BiologicalMe (talk) 12:02, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Charity work 

message: Why does the article make a point of saying 'he pronounced his birth name as "Fred-rick Charles Willard", but did not specify the spelling of his first name, and noted that his father was also "Fred-rick Willard" but with a different spelling.'? "Fred-rick" is the standard pronunciation of "Frederick" in modern English, so it makes more sense without the hyphen. I'm going to alter this sentence.Sadiemonster (talk) 08:00, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: I think I may have also reverted you when I reverted a bunch of other stuff today; you weren't the target for that.  To the point: I tried to make a judgement call on that.  The sourcing problem with his first name is subtle but significant: He said that he and his father's names are spelled differently.  So at least one of them must be nonstandard.  And then he spelled out his mother's maiden name, but not his or his fathers' names.  So, I specified a neutral written pronunciation that nobody would mistake for the correct written form of either name, so that it's clear that, even though it's the "standard" pronunciation both times, a reader won't glance at the sentence and infer that Fred Willard said on tape that his name was "Frederick" as commonly spelled.  We don't know which person's name, if either, had the most common spelling.  (Someone might try and wiggle out of this by saying that it must be the father's name that is nonstandard because someone would have caught the actor's/son's spelling by now.  But we can't even get his birthdate nailed down definitively from that interview right now, let alone a spelling situation that he said was unusual.  If one looks closely at the sources we have so far, there is no first-party source for the father's or son's spelling.  There is a 1940 Census record, and sometimes Wikipedia editors absurdly declare Census sheets as definitive, but this Census page itself proves that stance to be ridiculous: The Census enumerator, speaking to Ruth, the mother of the family, wrote "Fred C" for the father and "Frederick" with no middle initial for the son, so clearly the enumerator was not asking for spellings, but instead was writing down whatever was close enough.  So, in the face of Willard's own claim, either his or his father's name must be nonstandard, and I didn't want some Wikipedia fly-by do-gooder to flat-out claim that the actor's name is "Frederick" just because the Census line says it, or because a bunch of low-effort tertiary sources just assumed the common spelling over the years without knowing or caring that the actor himself indicated that it wasn't so straightforward.)  This probably could be solved if someone releases his birth certificate from Cuyahoga County, Ohio. --Closeapple (talk) 22:23, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fred-rick? 

message: According to his daughter and sources he died at the age of 86.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.122.216.158 (talk) 14:51, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: If one looks at the discussions, this seems to be a controversial thing. I would guess that he shaved a few years off as it's sometimes more convenient for an actor. --Clibenfoart (talk) 15:00, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

text: But his daughter's word (or possibly her publicist's words in her name) say 86 according to Rolling Stone, which kicks it back to 1933–1934.  I suspect I'm going to post a pretty long analysis here so that we can point to it when some drive-bys start "helping" by sourcing from fourth-party websites. --Closeapple (talk) 22:39, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: I was implying 1939 was not correct, fwiw. Nohomersryan (talk) 01:08, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

text: Per The New York Times Obituary -> "Frederick Charles Willard Jr. was born on Sept. 18, 1933, in Cleveland, the only child of Frederick Willard, who worked in finance, and Ruth (Weinman) Willard. He grew up in Shaker Heights, the affluent suburb". I don't like the current setup as it looks sloppy. Perhaps a (September 18, 1933[note a] – May 15, 2020) with a note added next to the date of birth stating the uncertainty of his birthday but seeing that multiple obits say he was 86 years old when he died that that is what's being reflected on the article (it would also reduce the size of the early life section seeing it's mainly about this uncertainty) --TDKR Chicago 101 (talk) 04:51, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

text: Can you point us to some of the sources?  I can't find them easily. --Closeapple (talk) 05:27, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

text: See WP:IMDB/BLP and WP:RS/IMDB.  IMDb is untraceable user-submitted noise: There's no way to tell which dates are copy-pastes from God-knows-where, which are publicist requests, which are some user's "recollection" because they knew someone's brother 20 years ago, and which are just made up.  Only the writers' credits actually tagged as WGA, and the MPAA movie ratings, are reliably sourced on IMDb.  In other words, it's basically worse than a random message board, because at least on a message board someone can reply and point out some nonsense immediately. --Closeapple (talk) 18:43, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text:  Maybe then the birthdate section should have a note mentioning the 1933 1939 issue. OcelotCreeper (talk) 18:46, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

text: With Fred Willard, Jr.'s 1933 birthdate, this would tie in with Willard saying his father died when he (i.e. Fred, Jr.) was 12.  Everything -- the family statement, census records, school graduation dates, and now this -- points to the 1933 birthdate.  I understand still noting the 1939 claim, mind you.  70.54.30.101 (talk) 23:29, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Age of Death 

message: Article is locked. Please add links for Space Force (film). Thank you. —scarecroe (talk) 22:18, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Space Force 

message: Just pinging some users who've previously mentioned Willard's birth name here, apologies if not appreciated. Anyway, I'm aware several reliable sources (Guardian, NYT, etc) spell his given name as "Frederick"; however, Willard's entry at Find a Grave and his death certificate obtained by TMZ would indicate he was Frederic Charles Willard. This may also tie into his claim that his name was spelt different to his father's, although the certificate of death also spells his father's name as "Frederic". Sigh. —Jonny Nixon (talk) 01:24, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd trust the death certificate over NYT since its an official government record of the individual in question over a news article which often has erroneous information. Perhaps adding a note next to his birthname almost like the note added in reference to his birthday/age. --TDKR Chicago 101 (talk) 03:28, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: Cheers. —Jonny Nixon (talk) 04:30, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Name again 

message: I have reverted an editor's removal of the "Citation needed" tag related to content about burial. The edit summary that accompanied the removal said, "Removed request for citation, since "Find-A-Grave" in the External Link section confirms". Find a Grave is not a reliable source (WP:USERGENERATED). Therefore its appearance as an external link is not adequate support for unsourced content. Eddie Blick (talk) 21:25, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unsourced content about burial