John Dehner

Actor

About

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Also Known As

John Forkum

Birth Place

Staten Island, New York, USA

Born

November 23, 1915

Died

February 04, 1992

Cause of Death

Emphysema And Diabetes

Biography

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Tall, distinguished-looking character player usually cast as villains or humorless authority figures. Dehner began his career as an animation assistant at Walt Disney Studios, worked as an Army publicist during WWII and, as a Los Angeles radio news reporter, editor and announcer, netted his station a Peabody Award for his coverage of the first UN conference in San Francisco in the late 1...

Filmography

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Help Wanted: Kids (1986)

Jagged Edge (1985)

The Right Stuff (1983)

Airplane II: The Sequel (1982)

California Gold Rush (1981)

Photos & Videos

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Man On A Tightrope (1953) -- (Movie Clip) This Is Considered Amusing?

Plymouth Adventure (1952) -- (Movie Clip) We Be Loaded Deep

Family & Companions

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Evelyn Dehner

Wife

Biography

Tall, distinguished-looking character player usually cast as villains or humorless authority figures. Dehner began his career as an animation assistant at Walt Disney Studios, worked as an Army publicist during WWII and, as a Los Angeles radio news reporter, editor and announcer, netted his station a Peabody Award for his coverage of the first UN conference in San Francisco in the late 1940s. Dehner started acting in films in the mid-1940s, eventually appearing in over 100 features, mostly westerns or action films. As sheriff Pat Garrett, he proved a notable foil to Paul Newman's Billy the Kid in Arthur Penn's "The Left-Handed Gun" (1958).

Once voted "best radio voice" by "Radio Life Magazine," Dehner was a prolific radio performer during the 1950s, starring as J.B. Kendall, a Brit in the American West, on "Frontier Gentleman" and as Paladin on "Have Gun Will Travel." Throughout the 60s and 70s he made regular appearances on TV series including "The Westerner" (1960), "The Roaring Twenties" (1960-62), "The Don Knotts Show" (1970-71) "The Doris Day Show" (1971-73) and "Big Hawaii" (1977). Later roles included Secretary of State Dean Acheson in the miniseries "The Missiles of October" (1974), Admiral Ernest King in the miniseries "The Winds of War" (1983), Henry Luce in "The Right Stuff" (1983), and the judge in "Jagged Edge" (1985).

Filmography

Cast (Feature Film)

Help Wanted: Kids (1986)

Jagged Edge (1985)

The Right Stuff (1983)

Airplane II: The Sequel (1982)

California Gold Rush (1981)

The Boys From Brazil (1978)

The Lincoln Conspiracy (1977)

Fun With Dick And Jane (1977)

Danger in Paradise (1977)

The New Daughters of Joshua Cabe (1976)

Warden Mannering

Mountain Man (1976)

The Killer Inside Me (1976)

The Big Ripoff (1975)

Honky Tonk (1974)

The Missiles of October (1974)

The Day of the Dolphin (1973)

Slaughterhouse-Five (1972)

[Bertram Copeland] Rumfoord

Support Your Local Gunfighter (1971)

Dirty Dingus Magee (1970)

Tiger by the Tail (1970)

Sheriff Chancey Jones

The Cheyenne Social Club (1970)

Stiletto (1969)

The Helicopter Spies (1968)

The Hallelujah Trail (1965)

Youngblood Hawke (1964)

Critic's Choice (1963)

S. P. Champlain

The Chapman Report (1962)

Geoffrey Harnish

The Canadians (1961)

Timbuktu (1959)

Cast a Long Shadow (1959)

Apache Territory (1958)

Grant Kimbrough

Man of the West (1958)

The Left Handed Gun (1958)

The Sign of Zorro (1958)

Trooper Hook (1957)

Revolt at Fort Laramie (1957)

Maj. Seth Bradner

The Iron Sheriff (1957)

[Roger] Pollock

The Girl in Black Stockings (1957)

Sheriff [Jess] Holmes

Carousel (1956)

Terror at Midnight (1956)

A Day of Fury (1956)

The Fastest Gun Alive (1956)

Please Murder Me (1956)

Tension at Table Rock (1956)

The King's Thief (1955)

The Man from Bitter Ridge (1955)

Duel on the Mississippi (1955)

The Scarlet Coat (1955)

Nathanael Greene

The Prodigal (1955)

Tall Man Riding (1955)

Ames Luddington

Southwest Passage (1954)

The Cowboy (1954)

The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters (1954)

Dr. Derek Gravesend

Capt. J. Donald

Powder River (1953)

Man on a Tightrope (1953)

Fort Algiers (1953)

The Steel Lady (1953)

Gun Belt (1953)

Cripple Creek (1952)

California Conquest (1952)

Don Fredo Brios

Aladdin and His Lamp (1952)

Lady in the Iron Mask (1952)

Count de Fourrier

Scaramouche (1952)

Harem Girl (1952)

Desert Passage (1952)

Junction City (1952)

Emmet Sanderson

Plymouth Adventure (1952)

Gilbert Winslow

The Flying Missile (1951)

Lieutenant commander

Al Jennings of Oklahoma (1951)

China Corsair (1951)

Ten Tall Men (1951)

Hot Lead (1951)

When the Redskins Rode (1951)

Corky of Gasoline Alley (1951)

Lorna Doone (1951)

Baron de Wichehalse

The Texas Rangers (1951)

John Wesley Hardin

Counterspy Meets Scotland Yard (1951)

Robert Reynolds

Fort Savage Raiders (1951)

Capt. Michael Craydon

Three Secrets (1950)

Rogues of Sherwood Forest (1950)

Mary Ryan, Detective (1950)

Bodyhold (1950)

Sir Raphael Brokenridge

Riders of the Pony Express (1950)

Destination Murder (1950)

Dynamite Pass (1950)

David Harding, Counterspy (1950)

Last of the Buccaneers (1950)

Sergeant Beluche

Texas Dynamo (1950)

Captive Girl (1950)

Backfire (1950)

Blake, plainclothesman

Feudin' Rhythm (1949)

Gregory Biddleton

The Secret of St. Ives (1949)

Barbary Pirate (1949)

Bandits of El Dorado (1949)

Horsemen of the Sierras (1949)

Prejudice (1949)

I Cheated the Law! (1949)

He Walked by Night (1948)

Assistant chief

Dream Girl (1948)

Radio announcer

Let's Live a Little (1948)

Golden Earrings (1947)

Vigilantes of Boomtown (1947)

Bob Fitzsimmons

Blonde Savage (1947)

It's a Joke, Son! (1947)

Her Kind of Man (1946)

The Searching Wind (1946)

American reporter in Paris

Rendezvous 24 (1946)

The Catman of Paris (1946)

The Last Crooked Mile (1946)

The Undercover Woman (1946)

Out California Way (1946)

German captain, radar

Captain Eddie (1945)

She Went to the Races (1945)

Christmas in Connecticut (1945)

State Fair (1945)

The Corn Is Green (1945)

Twice Blessed (1945)

Radio announcer

Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944)

Lieutenant commander

Lake Placid Serenade (1944)

Radio announcer

The Reluctant Dragon (1941)

Artist drawing baby in "Baby Weems" story conference

Cast (Special)

My Wives Jane (1971)

Vic Semple; Serial Star

The Bill Cosby Special, Or? (1971)

Tennessee Ernie Ford Meets King Arthur (1960)

Cast (Short)

The Moviemakers (1971)

Cast (TV Mini-Series)

War and Remembrance (1988)

The Winds of War (1983)

Bare Essence (1982)

Life Events

1944

Film acting debut in "Lake Placid Serenade"

Photo Collections

The Iron Sheriff - Movie Poster

Here is a Half-Sheet movie poster from The Iron Sheriff (1957), starring Sterling Hayden and Constance Ford.

Videos

Man On A Tightrope (1953) -- (Movie Clip) This Is Considered Amusing? Summoned by officials of the communist Czechoslovak government, circus manager Cernik (Fredric March) explains to interrogator John Dehner about his staff, and his difficulty in presenting politically skewed skits, with propagandist Adolphe Menjou listening, in Elia Kazan’s Man On A Tightrope, 1953.

Plymouth Adventure (1952) -- (Movie Clip) We Be Loaded Deep Exhaustive exposition from producer Dore Schary, focused on introducing Leo Genn and Gene Tierney as the Bradfords, Kathleen Lockhart as Mrs. Brewster, John Dehner as Winslow, Van Johnson as Alden, finally Spencer Tracy as Jones, Lloyd Bridges as Coppin, in MGM's Plymouth Adventure, 1952.

Critic's Choice (1963) -- (Movie Clip) He's Murdering The Play Opening from director Don Weis, Marilyn Maxwell on the Broadway stage, then we meet principals, Bob Hope (as critic Parker) and wife Lucille Ball, encountering John Dehner and Evan McCord, then at the newsroom Jerome Cowan and Richard Deacon, in Critic’s Choice, 1963, from the play loosely based on the real-life couple Walter and Jean Kerr.

Left Handed Gun, The (1958) -- (Movie Clip) You Can't Shoot A Sheriff Paul Newman as Billy the Kid seems overly thrilled by the calliope, after the burial of his new boss, bouncing off Southerner Moultrie (Hurd Hatfield) and lawman Garrett (John Dehner), then frightening pals Tom and Charlie (James Best, James Congdon), in Arthur Penn’s, The Left Handed Gun, 1958.

Tension At Table Rock -- (Movie Clip) You Send Back The Body Opening scene, Wes Tancred (Richard Egan), whose partner/boss Sam (Paul Richards) killed a guy during the credits, gets pounced by his lusty wife Cathy (Angie Dickinson), then has to confront the man, in Tension At Table Rock, 1956.

Man of the West -- (Movie Clip) Opening Credits Hard to say whether the mountains or Gary Cooper seem more immovable in the opening credit sequence from Anthony Mann's Man of the West, 1958, co-starring Lee J. Cobb, Julie London and Arthur O'Connell.

Timbuktu (1959) -- (Movie Clip) When My People Are Ready Gun trader Conway (Victor Mature) observing as the militant "emir" (John Dehner) shows little patience toward the wiser Mahomet Adoni (Leonard Mudie), in the Sudan circa 1940, in director Jacques Tourneur's Timbuktu, 1959.

Apache (1954) -- (Movie Clip) Which One's Geronimo? White men way stupid, letting Massai (Burt Lancaster) escape the train as showboat Weddle (John Dehner) indulges in a photograph, leading to a revelatory episode or two, in Robert Aldrich's Apache, 1954.

Apache (1954) -- (Movie Clip) Nobody Sings About Handcuffs Tail-end of the credits into Geronimo surrendering, Massai (Burt Lancaster) explaining to Nalinle (Jean Peters) why he won't go along, only to be grabbed by Seiber (John McIntire), in Robert Aldrich's Apache, 1954.

Secret of St. Ives, The -- (Movie Clip) Open, Viscount Opening credits, a sample of original text, and handy character introductions from The Secret of St. Ives, 1949, starring Richard Ney and Henry Daniell, from a Robert Louis Stevenson novel.

Secret of St. Ives, The -- (Movie Clip) Duel Beefy duel with bayonets between surprisingly athletic St. Ives (Richard Ney) and Cougelat (John Dehner), Napoleonic French prisoners held in Scotland, in The Secret of St. Ives, 1949, from a Robert Louis Stevenson novel.

Girl in Black Stockings, The -- (Movie Clip) It Was Horrible! David (Lex Barker) means to rescue Beth (Anne Bancroft) who's beginning to lose her bearings in The Girl in Black Stockings, 1957.

Tension at Table Rock - (Original Trailer) When the owner of a stagecoach station is killed, a gunman takes his place in Tension at Table Rock (1956) starring Richard Egan.

Critic's Choice - (Original Trailer) Bob Hope and Lucille Ball star in the movie Critic's Choice (1962) based on Ira Levin's Broadway comedy hit.

Cast a Long Shadow - (Original Trailer) Audie Murphy plays a hard-drinking drifter who tries to claim a deceased cattle baron's estate in Cast A Long Shadow (1959).

California Conquest - (Original Trailer) A wealthy landowner (Cornel Wilde) leads the fight to leave Mexican rule and make California a state in California Conquest (1952).

Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters, The - (Original Trailer) The Bowery Boys battle a family of mad scientists in The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters (1954).

State Fair (1945) - (Original Trailer) Jeanne Crain and Dana Andrews star in Rodgers & Hammerstein's musical version of State Fair (1945).

Cheyenne Social Club, The - (Original Trailer) An aging cowboy finds that the successful business he has inherited is actually a house of prostitution in The Cheyenne Social Club (1970).

Carousel - (Original Trailer) A dramatic love story unfolds between a rough-talking, macho carousel barker, and a young, innocent mill worker in Carousel (1956).

Boys From Brazil, The - (Original Trailer) A Nazi hunter (Laurence Olivier) tracks a mad scientist (Gregory Peck) out to bring back Hitler.

Support Your Local Gunfighter - (Original Trailer) When a con man (James Garner) sneaks off a train, he's mistaken for a gunman in Support Your Local Gunfighter (1971).

King's Thief, The - (Original Trailer) David Niven takes a rare villainous role in the swashbuckling adventure The King's Thief (1955) co-starring George Sanders and Roger Moore.

She Went To The Races - (Original Trailer) A pretty scientist (Frances Gifford) with a system for horse-race betting falls in love with a trainer in She Went To The Races (1945).

Companions

Evelyn Dehner

Wife

Bibliography

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