RIP Bob Hastings (Commissioner Gordon, Elroy Carpenter)
Posted: 2014-07-04 12:05am
NYT
Bob Hastings, Actor on ‘McHale’s Navy,’ Dies at 89
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
JULY 3, 2014
Bob Hastings, an actor best known for portraying Lt. Elroy Carpenter, a bumbling yes-man on the 1960s sitcom “McHale’s Navy,” died on Monday in Burbank, Calif. He was 89.
The cause was prostate cancer, Allison Knowles, his granddaughter, said,
Mr. Hastings appeared on “McHale’s Navy” throughout its run, from 1962 to 1966. The show starred Ernest Borgnine in the title role as the lieutenant commander of a misfit PT boat outfit in the South Pacific during World War II.
In the late 1950s Mr. Hastings had a recurring role in another military sitcom, “The Phil Silvers Show,” originally set on an Army base in Kansas.
He went on to appear in some of the most popular series of the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s, including “The Untouchables,” “Car 54, Where Are You?,” “The Twilight Zone,” “The Munsters,” “I Dream of Jeannie,” “Green Acres,” “Love, American Style,” “Ironside,” “All in the Family” and “Murder, She Wrote,” as well as the daytime drama “General Hospital.”
Robert Francis Hastings was born on April 18, 1925, in Brooklyn, and began his career at 11 on radio dramas. After serving in the Army Air Corps in World War II, he starred as Archie Andrews in a radio series based on the Archie comic books.
He branched out into television in its infancy, winning a role on “Captain Video and His Video Rangers” in 1949.
His voice-over work included cartoons like “Batman: The Animated Series” and the 2010 video game “Mafia II.”
Survivors include his wife of 66 years, the former Joan Rice; his daughters, Tricia Stone and Mary Joan Shaughnessy; his sons, Bob Jr. and Michael; his brother, Don; 10 grandchildren; and 11 great-grandchildren.