Barry Morse Dies: Played Lt. Gerard on The Fugitive: Also Appeared on Space:1999

[Braves2005]

Looks like we lost another legend from classic TV, Barry Morse, who played Lt. Phillip Gerard on The Fugitive who chased Richard Kimble all over the country for 4 years, has died at age 89. He also was a regular on Space:1999 in the mid 1970's along with Martin Landau and Barbara Bain.

Link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/cpress/20080204/ca_pr_on_en/obit_barry_morse_13

 

[NeilRattigan]

A fine actor. A tremendous loss.

In 1967, my parents let met stay up to watch the final episode in which Dr. Richard Kimble (David Janssen) finally confronts the one-armed man (Bill Raisch), and Lt. Gerard (Morse) finally realizes he has pursued the wrong man. One of the most memorable endings to a TV series.

 

[CrankyYankee]

The series two-hour finale, "The Judgment, Parts I and II", I believe ran over a period of two weeks in 1967.

I finally saw the ending sometime in the mid 1970's on AFN-TV while in the Army in Germany.

 

[Mark Giardina]

Morse is the last of the original cast to pass away. David Janssen died in 1980 of a heart attack and Bill Raisch, who played the one-arm man died of cancer in 1984.

I remember the final two episodes of The Fugitive. The final scene where Gerard shakes Kimble's hand as the doctor leaves the courthouse after being vindicated for the murder of his wife is priceless. (Note: If you look real careful at that scene you will notice that Gerard says something to Kimble, but the audience never hears it)

It would be nice if one of the cable networks would air that program, which ran for four years on ABC from 1963-67.

 

[AlbumOldies]

A&E ran it in the 90's; it sure rekindled my interest in the show since I was quite young when it originally aired. The first season, available in two volumes, is now out on DVD and it's excellent.

 

[Stanislav]

Re: Barry Morse Dies: Played Lt. Gerard on The Fugitive: Also Appeared on Space:

Great actor, and a genuinely nice guy from what I've read. So active was he in U.S. and Canadian productions that upon his death, many Brits were actually surprised to learn that he was one of them!

There's a great quote from him on the Wikipedia page for "The Fugitive," about the similarities between that show and the plot of "Les Miserables," and between the characters of Lt. Gerard and Inspector Javert:

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Quinn Martin.....admitted that The Fugitive was a "sort of modern rendition of the outline of Les Misérables." Morse accordingly went back to the Victor Hugo novel and studied the portrayal of Javert, to find ways to make the character more complex than the "conventional 'Hollywood dick'" Gerard had originally been conceived as. "I've always thought that we in the arts ... are all 'shoplifters,'" Morse said. "Everybody, from Shakespeare onwards and downwards ... But once you've acknowledged that ... when you set out on a shoplifting expedition, you go always to Cartier's, and never to Woolworth's!"