A celebration of Dick Van Dyke as he celebrates ’98 Years of Magic’
Earlier this year, NBC pulled out all the stops for it special “Carol Burnett: 90 Years of Laughter + Love.” And on Dec. 21, CBS is throwing a birthday party for one of its biggest stars, Dick Van Dyke, who headlined the landmark 1961-66 sitcom “The Dick Van Dyke Show” as well as the lighthearted detective series “Diagnosis, Murder,” which ran from 1993-2000.
“Dick Van Dyke: 98 Years of Magic” is a two-hour valentine to the actor, who celebrated his birthday on Dec. 13, featuring special guests such as Jane Seymour, Rob Reiner, Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen and testimonials from Carol Burnett, Mark Hamill and “Mary Poppins” herself, Julie Andrews. Song-and-dance also play an important part of the special. Van Dyke earned a Tony in 1961 for “Bye Bye Birdie” and reprised his role in the 1963 musical. He introduced the Oscar-winning tune “Chim Chim Cher-ee” from 1964’s “Mary Poppins” as well as the Academy Award-nominated “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” from the 1968 blockbuster musical of the same name.
The nonagenarian certainly doesn’t act his age. He’s spry, funny and loves to break out in song. And he’s still acting. His recently turned up on the long-running soap “Days of Our Lives” as a war veteran amnesiac. According to Michaelfairmantv.com, “Van Dyke has brought so such heart to his scenes…. It’s a testament to this television icon that even at 97-years-old, he still has the acting chops and that endearing quality that audiences have loved for decades.”
So in celebration of his 98th, let’s look back at his career:
Van Dyke’s first big professional job was pantomiming to records, which was a big thing in the 1940s. He and Phil Erickson became the Merry Mutes in 1946 and came out to Los Angeles. “We worked all over town for a couple of years,” he told me in a 2010 L.A. Times interview. “Mime was quite a thing then. We would sometimes do an opera, play a lot of Crosby, Spike Jones.”
It was during their engagement at the Chapman Park Hotel on Wilshire Blvd that he married his first wife in 1948 on the popular radio series “Bride and Groom” which taped at the hotel. “The emcee would come in and see the show,” related Van Dyke. “I let it drop I was planning on getting married. He said, ‘Come on the show,’ so I sent for my girlfriend back home and we did the show. We got a honeymoon in Mt. Hood, Oregon, and some free appliances. I couldn’t get married otherwise.”
The Merry Mutes and their families moved to Atlanta. The team eventually went their separate ways. Van Dyke ended up working at a local TV station and an announcer and talk show host. An old Army buddy, who was a director at CBS in New York, told the Tiffany Network about him and suggested they audition him. Van Dyke ended up getting a seven-year-contract with the network. In these early years he did two episodes of “The Phil Silvers Show’” (aka “Sgt. Bilko”) and was a comedic performer on “The Pat Boone Show” and “The Andy Williams Show.”
Van Dyke made his Broadway debut in 1959 in a short-lived musical revue with Bert Lahr called “The Girls Against the Boys” for which he won the Theatre World Award. “Silvers” scribe Aaron Ruben, who also penned the revue took him, under wing. “I have only heard recently that he was the guy who dropped the word to director Gower Champion and that’s how I got the audition for ‘Bye Bye Birdie.” And that lead to “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” for which won him three consecutive Emmys for lead actor in a comedy series. Van Dyke played TV comedy variety writer Rob Petrie and Mary Tyler Moore was his capri pant-clad wife Laura.
Carl Reiner, the series creator-writer-producer who also played Alan Brady on the show, had initially wrote and starred in the pilot for the series “Head of the Family.” It didn’t sell because CBS wasn’t thrilled with Reiner. “Carl saw me in ‘Bye Bye Birdie’ when he was casting the show. I got a week off from ‘Birdie,’ I came out here and the pilot and it sold.” And he described doing the series as “the best five years of my life.” Reiner ended the series after five seasons fearing they would begin to repeat themselves. The cast felt different. “I didn’t want to quit. I would still be doing it today.”
Just as Moore proved her dramatic chops especially in her Oscar-nominated turn in 1980’s “Ordinary People,” Van Dyke turned out to be an exceptional dramatic actor. In fact, he and Moore reunited in 2002 in D.L Coburn’s “The Gin Game” for PBS. He earned an Emmy nomination as an alcoholic in 1974’s “The Morning After” admitting he had been battling the disease. The same year, he played a murderer in the “Negative Reaction” episode of “Columbo.”
It was Reiner who gave him his first substantial dramatic role in 1969’s “The Comic.” Van Dyke plays a famous silent film clown that offscreen was an absolute hell who run roughshod over everyone. Reviews with mixed though the Hollywood Reporter thought the actor gave a fine portrayal. Audiences didn’t want to see Van Dyke playing such a heel. The film soon disappeared from theaters.
Van Dyke and Reiner were still proud of the film in 2019. Reiner told the Hollywood Reporter the actor “deserved the Academy Award.” Van Dyke wanted to add a comedic bit to a scene where his now-elderly character is watching one of his silent comedies on TV while he’s eating an egg for breakfast. “I wanted to just lift my leg and break wind,” Van Dyke told THR. “The studio wouldn’t let me. Back in those days you couldn’t [do that].”
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