This guy also played the Hotel Manager who interviewed Jack Nicholson in 'The Shining'.
Posted on 04/13/2007 3:05:08 PM PDT by Borges
LOS ANGELES Actor Barry Nelson, an M-G-M contract player during the 1940s who later had a prolific theater career and was the first actor to play James Bond on screen, has died. He was 89.
His wife, Nansi Nelson, says her husband died last Saturday in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, while traveling. The cause of death is not yet known.
Nelson entered the Army during World War Two and went on the road with other actors performing the wartime play "Winged Victory," which was later made into a movie starring Red Buttons, George Reeves and Nelson.
After the war., Nelson starred in a string of movies such as "Undercover Maisie," "Time to Kill" and "Tenth Avenue Angel."
He is also the answer to the trivia question: Who was the first actor to play James Bond? Before Sean Connery was tapped to play the British agent on the big screen in "Dr. No," Nelson played Bond in a one-hour T-V adaptation of "Casino Royale" in 1954.
I remember him best as Capt. Anson Harris, in “Airport”.
Yeah but the Casino Royale TV adaptation made Bond an American and called him Jimmy instead of James. Never seen it but I have read it’s ok but nothing special except for being the first.
A familiar face from 50’s/60’s TV.
He was at his best in the comedy “Mary, Mary” (1963).
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