Tim Conway
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Tim Conway (born December 15, 1933) is an American comedic actor. Conway was born Thomas Daniel Conway, but changed his first name to "Tim" to avoid confusion with actor Tom Conway. He was born in the Cleveland, Ohio suburb Willoughby and grew up in nearby Chagrin Falls. He attended Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio, majoring in speech and radio. After graduating, he joined the Army, following which he took a job answering mail for a Cleveland radio station, where he went on to become a writer in the promotional department. He later worked with Cleveland broadcasting legend Ernie Anderson on WKYC TV and WJW TV and recorded a comedy album with Anderson.
Conway gained a national following from his appearance in the 1960s sitcom McHale's Navy. Afterwards, he starred in a string of series. 1967's Rango starred Conway as an incompetent Texas Ranger. In the 1970s, The Tim Conway Show paired Tim with Joe Flynn of McHale's Navy in a sitcom set in the confined set of a DC-3. Having "nowhere to run", this pressurized situation was ideal for the fast repartee of the lead actors. He was often paired with fellow funnyman Don Knotts in family films from Disney, including the popular The Apple Dumpling Gang series.
[edit] The Carol Burnett Show
Conway is probably best known for his work on The Carol Burnett Show where his unscripted antics often caused his fellow players to fall out of character by bursting out in laughter. For example, in a sketch where Conway and Harvey Korman are having a swordfight duel in medieval garb, Korman appears to run him through. Conway pulls the thin sword "out", looks at it as if it were a dipstick, and remarks, "Hmm... down a quart!" and Korman convulses.
On many episodes of the show, Conway would have Ernie Anderson in the audience and Carol would ask him to stand up and take a bow, without explanation, as if he were a famous celebrity.
Conway's work on the show earned him three Emmy Awards. Two of Conway's memorable characters on the Burnett Show were:
- "The Old Man," whose shaggy white hair, slow speech, and shuffling gait ran counter to the needed energy levels of the various occupations he was usually found in. His comic inability to get said jobs done — usually with slapstick results to himself, and with many an ad-lib — would both frustrate and 'break up' his fellow sketch performers.
- "Mr. Tudball," a Swedish-American businessman whose intentions of running a 'ship-shape' office were usually sunk by the bored indifference of his secretary, "Mrs. Whiggins" (Burnett). Conway's stereotypical Swedish accent (especially when frustrated) added to the humor; for example, his attempts to pronounce his secretary's name came out as "Mrs. Ah-huh-whiggins". He would also use this accent for other characters, such as an inept dentist.
Conway could also get results with no dialogue, as in a sketch in which he played a tired businessman seeking restful sleep in his hotel — and pestered by a housefly, created only by a sound effect and Conway's gazing after it. After much struggle, he manages to get the fly out of the room through the window; after returning to bed, he hears a persistent knock on his door, gets up to answer it, and opens the door, letting the fly (who was doing the knocking) back in.
Another well-remembered skit, also without a word from Conway, featured him playing Elsa, the lioness raised by humans then released to the wild (seen in the film Born Free). Conway, told of the upcoming eviction from the comfortable home, caused Burnett and Korman to break up with an interminable process of packing to leave.
[edit] Dorf
Conway's more recent work includes a series of satirical how-to videos in which he plays a diminutive, dark-haired Scandinavian known as Dorf (a variation on "dwarf"), reprising his goofy Mr. Tudball accent. The Dorf character first appeared in the 1987 film Dorf on Golf.
Conway continues to appear in movies and has cameo appearances in TV series; most of these appearances showcase his comedic talent. Currently, Conway voices the character "Barnacle Boy" in a recurring role on the popular Nickelodeon cartoon series SpongeBob SquarePants; in this role, he is once again paired up as the sidekick to his old McHale's Navy co-star, Ernest Borgnine (who voices Mermaid Man, the "mentor" of Barnacle Boy). He appeared several times on the sitcom Married... With Children portraying the father of Peg Bundy. Conway also guest stars occasionally on the CBS sitcom Yes Dear, playing the father of Anthony Clark's stuffy character, Greg, with Conway's old Carol Burnett Show co-star Vicki Lawrence playing his wife, Greg's overbearing mother. Conway appeared in animated form in a guest shot in the October 6, 1973 episode of The New Scooby Doo Movies, "The Spirited Spooked Sports Show." In 2003, he returned to television on the short-lived WB Network comedy, One The Spot.
During The Biography Channel's biography of Conway, Borgnine referred to Conway as "a credit to his profession" and Burnett said words to the effect that Conway's talent for comedy was only outstripped by his genuine kindness and good nature.
A fan of thoroughbred horse racing, and an occasional racehorse owner, Tim Conway is a co-founder, Vice President, and member of the Board of Directors of the Don MacBeth Memorial Jockey Fund. [1]
Conway's son, Tim Conway Jr., hosts the Conway and Whitman radio show on KLSX in Los Angeles, California.
