Orson Bean

Orson Bean (July 22, 1928 - February 7, 2020) was an American actor who provided the voice for Bilbo in The Hobbit and Frodo in The Return of the King, in the 1977 and 1980 Rankin/Bass animated films. He was a cousin of Calvin Coolidge.
== Biography ==
Orson Bean was born Dallas Frederick Burroughs on July 22, 1928 in Burlington, Vermont to George Burroughs, a policeman who later went on to become the chief of campus police at Harvard University, and the former Marian Pollard. The newborn Dallas Burroughs was a second cousin once removed to Calvin Coolidge, who was President of the United States at the time of his birth. The young Dallas, an amateur magician with a taste for the limelight, graduated from Boston's prestigious Latin School in 1946. Too young to see military service during World War II, the future Orson Bean did a hitch in the United States Army (1946-47) in occupied Japan.
After the war, he launched himself onto the nightclub circuit with his new moniker, the "Orson" borrowed from reigning enfant terrible Orson Welles. His comedy act premiered at New York City's Blue Angel nightclub, and the momentum from his act launched him into the orbit of the legitimate theater. He made his Broadway debut on April 30, 1954 in Stalag 17 (1953) producer Richard Condon's only Broadway production as a playwright, "Men of Distinction", along with Robert Preston and Martin Ritt. The play was only shown four times.
The following year proved kinder: he hosted a summer-replacement television series produced at the Blue Angel, and won a Theatre World Award for his work in the 1954 music revue "John Murray Anderson's Almanac", which co-starred Harry Belafonte, Polly Bergen, Hermione Gingold and Carleton Carpenter. It was a hit that ran for 229 performances. He followed this up with an even bigger hit, the leading role in "Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter". Next up was a success d'estime as the leading man in Herman Wouk's comic play "Nature's Way", which co-starred Bea Arthur, Sorrell Booke and Godfrey Cambridge. The play lasted 67 performances, and Bean had established himself on the Broadway stage.
He was fatally injured in a traffic accident on February 7, 2020.
== External links ==
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Category:American actors
Category:Voice actors
Category:Deceased actors
Category:The Hobbit (1977) actors