My evolving appreciation for thespian talent began with comic hams, only slowly taking in the more nuanced types like Victor French.

As a ’50s kid growing up in Chicago, TV was a fact of my life from the get-go – and the actors were the first thing I noticed.

In fact, my noticing actors consisted of noting how many of them were in the old Poverty-Row movies and the newer television films, only separated by 10-20 years at that time.

This is what started me reading TV Guide in detail: to see which actors were appearing in which shows – and which older movies that were turning up at odd hours.

By the time I was in high school, I prided myself on being able to identify on sight character actors, second leads, and very pretty girls from several eras of Hollywood. I carried this through to adulthood, ultimately becoming the annoying old man I am today.

So that’s me.
Thanks for setting me off.

While I saw Little House a lot, and probably other shows Mr French was in (but not all of them would make it to the UK at the time), as a kid I didn’t seem to register actors much, except comics and scary bad guys. Plus aspirational figures like Gene Kelly and Errol Flynn, whom I envied.

My love of character actors seems to have blossomed around the same time I started appreciating glamorous actresses in movies too.