Arte Johnson

Arte Johnson didn’t start acting until his mid-20s, and didn’t make any serious headway on TV for another decade. Perhaps his most notable role to a UK audience before his major breakthrough was as Samantha’s mute cousin Edgar in a first series episode of Bewitched. However, he broke through fully in 1968 with a regular role on Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-InTwo of his characters entered the American pop cultural vernacular: the seedy old man Tyrone F. Horneigh who propositioned Ruth Buzzi’s spinster character before getting hit with a handbag, and the German World War II soldier Wolfgang, who would regularly comment on the proceedings with “very interesting… but stupid”. He effectively retired from TV in the 1990s, meaning I was surprised when I realised he was still alive and thus eligible for the 2019 DDP.

Arte Johnson
January 20, 1929 – July 3, 2019
Died aged 90 (two picks)