Fran Ryan
Acting
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Fran Ryan (November 29, 1916 – January 15, 2000) was an American character actress featured in television and films. She was born in Los Angeles, California. Fran Ryan began performing at the age of 6, at Oakland's Henry Duffy Theatre, in Northern California. She attended Stanford University for three years, and during World War II was a member of the USO entertaining troops. She performed comedy, singing and acting on stage in California and Chicago but was not to launch her television career for two decades. Her small screen debut came in an episode on Television's Batman, in 1966, followed by a bit part in Beverly Hillbillies. Ryan's best known television role was as Aggie Thompson in The Doris Day Show (in its first incarnation plotline theme), though the gig only lasted a few months. This role was cut short because she was offered the 'replacement' role on the hit series Green Acres as Doris Ziffel from 1969-1971. Fran was to replace Barbara Pepper, who by then was in poor health. Sadly, Miss Pepper died just five months later of heart ailments, on July 15, 1969. Ryan also starred on the long running TV Western series Gunsmoke during its twentieth and final season as Miss Hannah (Cobb). In 1987, she reprised the role of Miss Hannah in the TV movie Gunsmoke: Return to Dodge. Fran Ryan played the role of Sister Agatha in the soap opera General Hospital in (1979). She also did voices for cartoons such as Hong Kong Phooey, Mister T and Little Dracula. Fran starred on some TV shows for children like Sigmund and the Sea Monsters in 1975 as Gertrude Grouch, and in 1970s children's show The New Zoo Revue as Ms. Goodbody, the 1980s TV series No Soap, Radio as Mrs. Belmont, the short lived 1980s CBS TV series The Wizard as Tillie Russell from 1986-1987. Her last regular TV role was on The Dave Thomas Comedy Show. She starred in many feature films, including Flush (1977), Big Wednesday (1978), Take This Job and Shove It (1981), Pale Rider (1985), Chances Are, and in her scene-stealing cameo in 1981's Stripes, as a tortured cab fare to Bill Murray as the cabbie, in the opening scenes of the comedy film. Ryan made guest appearances on TV shows ranging from Batman, Adam-12, CHiPs, Quantum Leap, Night Court, Baywatch to The Commish. Fran Ryan was often compared to actress Marjorie Main; they looked similar to one another. Ryan died on January 15, 2000, at age 83. She is buried in the family plots alongside her mother, at the Holy Sepulchre Catholic Cemetery, in Hayward, California. Description above from the Wikipedia article Fran Ryan, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Known For
An unassuming mystery writer turned sleuth uses her professional insight to help solve real-life homicide cases.
Murder, She Wrote
Falcon Crest is an American primetime television soap opera which aired on the CBS network for nine seasons, from December 4, 1981 to May 17, 1990. A total of 227 episodes were produced. The series revolves around the feuding factions of the wealthy Gioberti/Channing family in the Californian wine industry. Jane Wyman starred as Angela Channing, the tyrannical matriarch of the Falcon Crest Winery, alongside Robert Foxworth as Chase Gioberti, Angela's nephew who returns to Falcon Crest following the death of his father. The series was set in the fictitious Tuscany Valley northeast of San Francisco.
Falcon Crest
Adam-12 is a television police drama that followed two police officers of the Los Angeles Police Department, Pete Malloy and Jim Reed, as they patrolled the streets of Los Angeles in their patrol unit, 1-Adam-12.
Adam-12
Join the Baywatch lifeguards on their thrilling adventures filled with beautiful beaches and those iconic red swimsuits.
Baywatch
Wealthy entrepreneur Bruce Wayne and his ward Dick Grayson lead a double life: they are actually crime fighting duo Batman and Robin. A secret Batpole in the Wayne mansion leads to the Batcave, where Police Commissioner Gordon often calls with the latest emergency threatening Gotham City. Racing to the scene of the crime in the Batmobile, Batman and Robin must (with the help of their trusty Bat-utility-belt) thwart the efforts of a variety of master criminals, including The Riddler, The Joker, Catwoman, and The Penguin.
Batman
Beautiful, intelligent, and ultra-sophisticated, Charlie's Angels are everything a man could dream of... and way more than they could ever handle! Receiving their orders via speaker phone from their never seen boss, Charlie, the Angels employ their incomparable sleuthing and combat skills, as well as their lethal feminine charm, to crack even the most seemingly insurmountable of cases.
Charlie's Angels
A realistic glimpse into the daily lives of the officers and detectives at an urban police station.
Hill Street Blues
Theorizing that one could time travel within his own lifetime, Dr. Sam Beckett stepped into the Quantum Leap accelerator and vanished... He woke to find himself trapped in the past, facing mirror images that were not his own and driven by an unknown force to change history for the better. His only guide on this journey is Al, an observer from his own time, who appears in the form of a hologram that only Sam can see and hear. And so Dr. Beckett finds himself leaping from life to life, striving to put right what once went wrong and hoping each time that his next leap will be the leap home.
Quantum Leap
The Waltons live their life in a rural Virginia community during the Great Depression and World War II.
The Waltons
In the fictional town of Fernwood, Ohio, suburban housewife Mary Hartman seeks the kind of domestic perfection promised by Reader’s Digest and TV commercials. Instead she finds herself suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune: mass murders, low-flying airplanes and waxy yellow buildup on her kitchen floor.
Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman
An eccentric fun-loving judge presides over an urban night court and all the silliness going on there.
Night Court
Thrifty, folksy and cantankerous, Matlock charges a premium for his services but is worth every penny: This renowned attorney, always clothed in his trademark light-gray suit and driving his signature Ford Crown Victoria, has an uncanny knack for finding overlooked clues and exposing murderers in dramatic courtroom scenes.
Matlock
Barney Miller is the kind of cop we'd all like to run into. Always sensible, he maintains order over a band of detectives who gamble, hit on anything in skirts, go to renaissance philosophy conventions for fun, and would really prefer to be writing. Nearly all of the action takes place in the squad room where citizens and criminals are brought in to complicate the mix.
Barney Miller
Streetwise Detective David Starsky partners up with a more intellectual partner, Kenneth 'Hutch' Hutchinson, to protect citizens and patrol the streets of Bay City.
Starsky & Hutch
Green Acres is an American sitcom starring Eddie Albert and Eva Gabor as a couple who move from New York City to a rural country farm. Produced by Filmways as a sister show to Petticoat Junction, the series was first broadcast on CBS, from September 15, 1965 to April 27, 1971. Receiving solid ratings during its six-year run, Green Acres was cancelled in 1971 as part of the "rural purge" by CBS. The sitcom has been in syndication and is available in DVD and VHS releases. In 1997, the two-part episode "A Star Named Arnold is Born" was ranked #59 on TV Guide's 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time.
Green Acres
Daniel Boone is an American action-adventure television series starring Fess Parker as Daniel Boone that aired from September 24, 1964 to September 10, 1970 on NBC for 165 episodes, and was made by 20th Century Fox Television. Ed Ames co-starred as Mingo, Boone's Cherokee friend, for the first four seasons of the series. Albert Salmi portrayed Boone's companion Yadkin in season one only. Dallas McKennon portrayed innkeeper Cincinnatus. Country Western singer-actor Jimmy Dean was a featured actor as Josh Clements during the 1968–1970 seasons. Actor and former NFL football player Rosey Grier made regular appearances as Gabe Cooper in the 1969 to 1970 season. The show was broadcast "in living color" beginning in fall 1965, the second season, and was shot entirely in California and Kanab, Utah.
Daniel Boone
Louie De Palma is a cantankerous, acerbic taxi dispatcher in New York City. He tries to maintain order over a collection of varied and strange characters who drive for him. As he bullies and insults them from the safety of his “cage,” they form a special bond among themselves, becoming friends and supporting each other through the inevitable trials and tribulations of life.
Taxi
While on a mission, American astronaut Captain Tony Nelson is forced to make an emergency landing that will forever change his life. On a deserted South Pacific island, Captain Nelson happens upon a bottle containing a beautiful two-thousand-year-old female genie named Jeannie. Rescuing her from the bottle nets Tony the requisite three wishes, and then some, when Jeannie pledges total devotion to her new "master".
I Dream of Jeannie
A probationary angel is sent back to Earth to team up with an ex-cop and help people.
Highway to Heaven
Best friends, roommates, and polar opposites, Laverne DeFazio and Shirley Feeney work together at the Shotz Brewery in Milwaukee and keep each other's spirits up at home.