LOS ANGELES (CelebrityAccess) – Comedian and actor George Robert Newhart, who helped pioneer the comedy special, has died. He is 94 years old.
Newhart died Thursday at his home in Los Angeles after a series of brief illnesses, the Associated Press reported. No further information on the cause of death has been released.
Known for his dry, hesitant comedy style and one-sided comedy phone conversations, Newhart began his career as a stand-up comedian before successfully transitioning to television in the 1970s.
Newhart, a Chicago native, graduated from Loyala University in 1952 with a business degree before drafting into the Army to fight in the Korean War.
After his military service, he found work as an accountant but soon found work as an advertising copywriter for Chicago film and television producer Fred A. Niles. There, he and a colleague developed telephone-based comedy routines that soon attracted the attention of Warner Bros. Records, which signed Newhart in 1959 as he developed a complete Stand-up comedy routine.
His debut album, The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart, came out in 1960 and topped the Billboard charts, winning Newhart Grammy Awards for Album of the Year and Best New Artist in 1961.
That same year, Newhart began hosting a short-lived NBC variety show called “The Bob Newhart Show,” but it wasn’t until 1972 that he began starring as Chicago psychologist Robert “The Bob Newhart Show.” Hartley became a television star.
In 1982, he returned to television, playing Vermont hotel owner Dick Loudin on the CBS sitcom “Newhart,” which ran for eight seasons before ending in 1990.
Newhart’s other film and television projects include the short-lived sitcom “Bob, George & Leo,” as well as films such as “Catch-22,” “Elf” and the animated film “The Rescuers.”
In 2002, Newhart received the Mark Twain Award for American Humor, and in 2004, he was ranked No. 14 on the list of “Comedy Central Presents: The 100 Greatest Stand-Ups of All Time.”
