1929-07-31 ( 95 years old ) in Hollywood, California, USA
Donald Patrick "Don" Murray (July 31, 1929-February 2, 2024) was an American actor.
Murray was born in Hollywood, California. He attended East Rockaway High School (class of 1947) in East Rockaway, New York where he played football and track, was a member of the student government and glee club and joined the Alpha Phi Chapter of the Omega Gamma Delta Fraternity. From high school he went on to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts.
Murray had a long and varied career in films and television, including his role as Sid Fairgate in the long-running prime-time soap opera Knots Landing from 1979 to 1981. He was nominated for an Academy Award as best supporting actor in Bus Stop (1956) in which he co-starred with Marilyn Monroe.
He starred as a blackmailed United States senator in Advise & Consent (1961), a film version of a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Allen Drury that was directed by Otto Preminger and cast Murray opposite Henry Fonda and Charles Laughton. He also co-starred with Steve McQueen in the film Baby the Rain Must Fall (1965) and played the ape-hating Governor Breck in Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972).
In addition to acting, Murray directed a film based on the book The Cross and the Switchblade (1970) starring Pat Boone and Erik Estrada, and he scripted two episodes of Knots Landing ("Hitchhike" parts 1 & 2) in 1980.
Murray starred with Otis Young in the ground breaking ABC western television series The Outcasts (1968-69) featuring an interracial bounty hunter team in the post-Civil War West.
Murray decided to leave Knots Landing after two years to concentrate on other projects, although some sources say he left over a salary dispute. The character's death was notable at the time because it was considered rare to "kill off" a star character. The death came in the second episode of season three, following up on season two's cliffhanger in which Sid's car careered off a cliff. To make viewers off doubt the character would actually die, Murray was listed in the newly created credit sequence for season three; the character survived the plunge off the cliff (thus temporarily reassuring viewers), but died shortly afterwards in hospital.
Although he effectively distanced himself from the series after his exit in 1981, Murray later contributed an interview segment for Knots Landing: Together Again, a non-fiction reunion special made in 2005.
Murray was the first husband of actress Hope Lange. They had two children, including actor Christopher Murray.
Movies
Gold of Rio Bravo: Sheriff Kelly's Story
2025-01-16
Promise
2021-04-06
Do Not Pick Up Hitchhikers
2017-12-05
Tab Hunter Confidential
2015-03-15
Marilyn Monroe: Death of an Icon
2010-02-10
Marilyn Monroe: I Want to Be Loved
2010-02-10
Riots & Revolutions: Confronting the Times
2008-11-04
Hollywood Legenden
2004-01-01
Island Prey
2001-01-01
Besuch bei Don Murray
2000-01-01
Alan Ladd: The True Quiet Man
1999-03-04
Internet Love
1998-07-03
Mr. Headmistress
1998-03-15
Twentieth Century Fox: The First 50 Years
1997-01-21
Marilyn, divine et fragile
1996-12-31
Hearts Adrift
1996-08-07
Marilyn Monroe: The Mortal Goddess
1994-10-17
Shurtleff on Acting
1994-07-14
Preminger: Anatomy of a Filmmaker
1991-10-28
Ghosts Can't Do It
1989-10-17
My Dad Can't Be Crazy... Can He?
1989-09-14
Hollywood Uncensored
1987-12-01
Made in Heaven
1987-11-06
Mistress
1987-10-04
The Stepford Children
1987-03-15
Stillwatch
1987-02-10
Hollywood's Hidden Secrets
1987-01-01
License to Kill
1986-12-16
Scorpion
1986-12-01
Something in Common
1986-11-02
Peggy Sue Got Married
1986-10-10
Radioactive Dreams
1986-09-19
T.J. Hooker - Blood Sport
1986-05-21
Marilyn Monroe: Beyond the Legend
1986-04-19
A Touch of Scandal
1984-11-27
Quarterback Princess
1983-12-03
I Am The Cheese
1983-11-11
Thursday's Child
1983-02-01
Return of the Rebels
1981-10-17
Endless Love
1981-07-17
Fugitive Family
1980-10-01
Police Story: Confessions of a Lady Cop
1980-04-28
The Boy Who Drank Too Much
1980-02-06
If Things Were Different
1980-01-16
Crisis in Mid-Air
1979-02-13
Rainbow
1978-11-06
Deadly Hero
1975-12-14
A Girl Named Sooner
1975-06-18
The Sex Symbol
1974-09-17
The Girl on the Late, Late Show
1974-04-01
Cotter
1973-01-01
Conquest of the Planet of the Apes
1972-06-29
Justin Morgan Had a Horse
1972-02-06
Happy Birthday, Wanda June
1971-12-09
The Intruders
1970-11-10
Daughter of the Mind
1969-12-09
Childish Things
1969-07-01
The Viking Queen
1967-03-25
The Borgia Stick
1967-02-25
Sweet Love, Bitter
1967-01-30
The Plainsman
1966-08-01
Kid Rodelo
1966-01-01
Baby, the Rain Must Fall
1965-01-12
One Man's Way
1964-02-26
Marilyn
1963-04-18
Escape from East Berlin
1962-10-22
Advise & Consent
1962-06-06
The Hoodlum Priest
1961-03-26
One Foot in Hell
1960-09-11
Hedda Hopper's Hollywood
1960-01-10
Winterset
1959-10-26
Shake Hands with the Devil
1959-06-24
These Thousand Hills
1959-05-07
From Hell to Texas
1958-04-29
A Hatful of Rain
1957-07-17
The Bachelor Party
1957-04-09
Bus Stop
1956-08-31
A Man Is Ten Feet Tall
1955-10-02
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