Scene-stealing comic actor Fred Willard dies
His improv style kept him relevant for more than 50 years in films like “Best In Show” and TV series like “Modern Family.”
— Fred Willard, the comedic actor whose improv style kept him relevant for more than 50 years in films like “This Is Spinal Tap,” “Best In Show” and “Anchorman,” has died. He was 86.
Willard’s daughter, Hope Mulbarger, said in a statement Saturday that her father died peacefully Friday night. His agent Mike Eisenstadt said Willard died of natural causes.
“He kept moving, working and making us happy until the very end,” Mulbarger said. “We loved him so very much! We will miss him forever.”
Willard was rarely a leading man or even a major supporting character. He specialized in small, scene-stealing appearances.
As an arrogantly clueless sports announcer on “Best In Show,” his character seemed to clearly know nothing about the dogs he’s supposed to talk about and asks his partner on-air: “How much do you think I can bench?”
Willard was a four-time Emmy nominee for his roles in “What’s Hot, What’s Not,” “Everybody Loves Raymond,” “Modern Family” and “The Bold and the Beautiful.”
“How lucky that we all got to enjoy Fred Willard’s gifts,” said actress Jamie Lee Curtis on Twitter. She was married to Christopher Guest who directed “Best in Show” and “Waiting for Guffman.”
“Thanks for the deep belly laughs Mr. Willard,” she continued.
Willard’s death comes nearly two years after his wife Mary Willard died at the age of 71. She was a playwright and TV writer, earning four Emmy nominations.
After his wife died, Willard questioned whether he would work again. But the beloved actor was brought on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” to mock President Donald
Trump’s “space force.” It was a reprise role of the 1978 NBC show “Space Force.”
“There was no man sweeter or funnier,” Kimmel said on Twitter. “We were so lucky to know Fred Willard and will miss his many visits.”
Born Sept. 18, 1939, Willard cultivated his wisecracking straight man persona as the son of a stern father who worked in a bank. He was raised middle class in Shaker Heights, Ohio, and fell in love with sketch comedy after seeing the 1950s vaudeville silliness of bandleader Spike Jones and the City Slickers.
Though Willard spent his formative years in military school, earning a graduate degree in English from Virginia Military Institute, his heart was always in show business.
After he spent his stint in the U.S. Army stationed in Germany, he moved to New York in the early 1960s to train as an actor. In no time, he and a classmate were appearing as a comedy duo on “The Ed Sullivan Show.”
Around 1965, Willard moved to Chicago to spend a year training with the groundbreaking improv group “The Second City.” Then he returned to New York and co-founded his own troupe, the Ace Trucking Co., which spent years performing on high-profile TV variety shows, opening for Tom Jones in Las Vegas and eventually releasing a comedy album.
Along the way, Willard co-starred in an off-Broadway black comedy with a 20-year-old Guest, a connection that would later change the course of his career.
“I knew something was off when Fred started doing lines that weren’t actually in the play to me,” Guest said in a TV interview in 2007. “I didn’t know what to make of it. I said to myself, ‘You’re different.’”
By 1977, Willard was appearing with Martin Mull as host of a short-lived parody talk show, “Fernwood 2 Night,” created by Norman Lear. That led to another brief hosting gig for the NBC reality series “Real People.”
But it was Willard’s mastery of the mockumentary, starting with the 1984 film “This Is Spinal Tap,” that first earned him widespread notice. In that film, he played an Air Force officer trying to prove his hipster cred with a series of cringe-worthy jokes. And though it was years before the film reached cult status, Willard had discovered his place.
He spent the 1980s and ’90s bouncing around TV with a few notable recurring parts, including as Mull’s gay partner in “Roseanne.” That same year, he appeared the Oscar-winning comedic short film “Ray’s Male Heterosexual Dance Hall.”
In Guest’s 2000 comedy “Best in Show,” Willard earned enduring success as an over-the-top dog show host. Willard’s bone-headed — and improvised — interstitial remarks to his prim, British co-host became one of the highlights of the film. He won an American Comedy Award for the performance.