Actor Laurence Haddon Dies at 90 Laurence Haddon, a busy character actor who appeared on dozens of TV
series like Dallas, Lou Grant and Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman during his
four-decade career, has died. He was 90.
Haddon died May 10 in Santa Monica from complications associated with
Lewy body disease, a form of dementia, his daughter-in-law Eilene Vila
Schmidt said Tuesday. He was 90.
Hartman, Haddon portrayed one of the first non-stereotypical gay men to
appear on national television. In a 1976 episode, he's caught kissing
another man (neighbors were led to believe that they were brothers),
and later the couple consider getting married.
Haddon also was seen on three CBS series in the 1970s and '80s: as
J.R.'s banker Franklin Horner on primetime soap Dallas, as the foreign
editor on the newsroom drama Lou Grant and as the crooked Dr. Mitch
Ackerman, who memorably stole Joan Van Ark's babies, on Knots Landing,
another soapy drama.
Haddon's lengthy résumé also includes stints on television's Dr.
Kildare, Dennis the Menace, Death Valley Days, My Three Sons, Sanford
and Son, Mannix, Good Times, The Rockford Files, Barnaby Jones, Vega$,
Hill Street Blues, T.J. Hooker and Designing Women. He appeared in the
1974 telefilm The Execution of Private Slovik and had roles in the
features Hands of a Stranger (1962), Fantastic Voyage (1966) and The
Graduate (1967).
Haddon was born in Philadelphia in 1922 and attended Friends' Central
School and Syracuse University. After Pearl Harbor, he left college and
served in the Merchant Marine during World War II as an officer on
Liberty ships ferrying munitions, other cargo and German prisoners in
the North Atlantic, Mediterranean and Pacific.
After the war, he did a brief stint in the aluminum business before
deciding to become an actor. He moved to New York, where he landed
parts on stage and in the early era of live TV.
Haddon went on the road in the national touring companies of Tea and
Sympathy with Maria Riva and The Warm Peninsula, which starred Julie
Harris and Larry Hagman and opened on Broadway in 1959.
In 1958, Haddon married actress-model Jacqueline Prevost, and they
moved to Los Angeles two years later. He was a consistent performer at
The Melrose, one of the first and most enduring waiver theaters in Los
Angeles.
In addition his daughter-in-law and wife, survivors include his
children Michael and Phoebe, stepson Guy and grandchildren Zoe and
Stephen.
HADDON, Laurence
Born: 1922, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.
Died: 5/10/2013, Santa Monica, California, U.S.A.
Laurence Haddon’s westerns – actor:
Death Valley Days (TV) – 1965, 1966 (Honest John, Phillips)
Daniel Boone (TV) – 1966 (Eli)
Here Come the Brides (TV) – 1969
Guns of Paradise (TV) – 1991 (Mr. Bass)