03-09-2022, 04:22 PM
.....probably best known for 'Mork & Mindy' but his face is recognizable in many TV/film roles and he played the trombone....
Conrad Janis, Trombonist and ‘Mork & Mindy’ Actor, Dies at 94
He starred on Broadway as a teenager and appeared in a Philip Marlowe movie at Fox when he was 19.
....Conrad Janis, the Dixieland trombonist and actor best known for playing the father of Pam Dawber’s character on the Robin Williams sitcom Mork & Mindy, has died. He was 94.
Janis died March 1 in Los Angeles, his business manager Dean Avedon told The New York Times.
Though just a youngster, Janis already was a Broadway veteran when he appeared in the 20th Century Fox film noir The Brasher Doubloon (1947) opposite George Montgomery (then-husband of Dinah Shore) in the Philip Marlowe movie.
On Frasier, Janis portrayed a character named Albert who lives in the same condo building as Frasier Crane (Kelsey Grammer) and his dad (John Mahoney). He also was a KAOS agent on Get Smart and a space station resident on Quark (Buck Henry had a hand in both of those series).
Janis played trombone in several appearances on The Tonight Show and at Carnegie Hall, and he recorded several albums with his group, the Tailgate Five. He also performed with actor George Segal on banjo in the Beverly Hills Unlimited Jazz Band.
Janis had a recurring role as Mindy’s dad, Fred McConnell — the owner of a music store, in a nice touch — on all four seasons (1978-82) of ABC’s Mork & Mindy. The bald-headed actor often was on the receiving end of Mork’s (Williams) barbs.
He was born in Manhattan on Feb. 11, 1928. His mother, Harriet, was a writer who co-authored the 1950 book They All Played Ragtime, and his father, Sidney, was an art dealer who in 1967 donated his private collection of 103 works, then valued at $2 million and including a Picasso, to New York’s Museum of Modern Art.
Janis made his Broadway debut when he was 13 in Junior Miss and stuck with the comedy through its lengthy New York run and then on a tour until he was 16. “I wanted to get out of school all my life,” he told film historian Alan K. Rode in 2012. “I never went to high school. It worked out perfectly.”
He came to California to make his movie debut, starring as a 16-year-old who enters the U.S. Army in Snafu (1945).
After co-starring with Jeanne Crain in Margie (1946), he landed a contract at Fox for $750 a week; most everyone got $75 a week to start, but he commanded the much higher salary because he had been on Broadway, he noted.
He then appeared in Warner Bros.’ That Hagen Girl (1947) in a much-derided drama that featured Ronald Reagan and Shirley Temple. (Spoiler alert: Those two presumably get married at the end of the movie.)......
RIP.........?!
Conrad Janis, Trombonist and ‘Mork & Mindy’ Actor, Dies at 94
He starred on Broadway as a teenager and appeared in a Philip Marlowe movie at Fox when he was 19.
....Conrad Janis, the Dixieland trombonist and actor best known for playing the father of Pam Dawber’s character on the Robin Williams sitcom Mork & Mindy, has died. He was 94.
Janis died March 1 in Los Angeles, his business manager Dean Avedon told The New York Times.
Though just a youngster, Janis already was a Broadway veteran when he appeared in the 20th Century Fox film noir The Brasher Doubloon (1947) opposite George Montgomery (then-husband of Dinah Shore) in the Philip Marlowe movie.
On Frasier, Janis portrayed a character named Albert who lives in the same condo building as Frasier Crane (Kelsey Grammer) and his dad (John Mahoney). He also was a KAOS agent on Get Smart and a space station resident on Quark (Buck Henry had a hand in both of those series).
Janis played trombone in several appearances on The Tonight Show and at Carnegie Hall, and he recorded several albums with his group, the Tailgate Five. He also performed with actor George Segal on banjo in the Beverly Hills Unlimited Jazz Band.
Janis had a recurring role as Mindy’s dad, Fred McConnell — the owner of a music store, in a nice touch — on all four seasons (1978-82) of ABC’s Mork & Mindy. The bald-headed actor often was on the receiving end of Mork’s (Williams) barbs.
He was born in Manhattan on Feb. 11, 1928. His mother, Harriet, was a writer who co-authored the 1950 book They All Played Ragtime, and his father, Sidney, was an art dealer who in 1967 donated his private collection of 103 works, then valued at $2 million and including a Picasso, to New York’s Museum of Modern Art.
Janis made his Broadway debut when he was 13 in Junior Miss and stuck with the comedy through its lengthy New York run and then on a tour until he was 16. “I wanted to get out of school all my life,” he told film historian Alan K. Rode in 2012. “I never went to high school. It worked out perfectly.”
He came to California to make his movie debut, starring as a 16-year-old who enters the U.S. Army in Snafu (1945).
After co-starring with Jeanne Crain in Margie (1946), he landed a contract at Fox for $750 a week; most everyone got $75 a week to start, but he commanded the much higher salary because he had been on Broadway, he noted.
He then appeared in Warner Bros.’ That Hagen Girl (1947) in a much-derided drama that featured Ronald Reagan and Shirley Temple. (Spoiler alert: Those two presumably get married at the end of the movie.)......
RIP.........?!
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I reject your reality and substitute my own!
I reject your reality and substitute my own!