Cast
Dabney Coleman
Acting
Cast
Dabney Coleman
Known for
Acting
Born
1932-01-03
From
Austin, Texas, USA
Died
2024-05-16
Also known as Dabney Wharton Coleman
Biography
Dabney Wharton Coleman (January 3, 1932 – May 16, 2024) was an American actor. Coleman's best known films include 9 to 5 (1980), On Golden Pond (1981), Tootsie (1982), WarGames (1983), Cloak & Dagger (1984), The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984), The Beverly Hillbillies (1993), You've Got Mail (1998), Inspector Gadget (1999), Recess: School's Out (2001), Moonlight Mile (2002), and Rules Don't Apply (2016). Coleman's television roles included the title characters of Buffalo Bill (1983–1984) and The Slap Maxwell Story (1987–1988), as well as Burton Fallin on The Guardian (2001–2004), the voice of Principal Peter Prickly on Recess (1997–2001), and Louis "The Commodore" Kaestner on Boardwalk Empire (2010–2011). He won one Primetime Emmy Award from six nominations and one Golden Globe Award from three nominations. Coleman was a character actor with roles in well over 60 films and television programs to his credit. He trained with Sanford Meisner at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre in New York City from 1958 to 1960. Coleman made his Broadway debut in the short-lived A Call on Kuprin in 1961. In a 1964 episode of Kraft Suspense Theatre titled "The Threatening Eye", Coleman played private investigator William Gunther. Two years later, he played Dr. Leon Bessemer with Bonnie Scott as his wife Judy, neighbors and friends of the protagonist in Season 1 of That Girl, episode 3, "Never Change a Diaper on Opening Night". Noted for his moustache which he grew in 1973, he appeared in the sitcom wearing horn-rimmed glasses and with no facial hair. Other early roles in his career included a U.S. Olympic skiing team coach in Downhill Racer (1969), a high-ranking fire chief in The Towering Inferno (1974), and a wealthy Westerner in Bite the Bullet (1975). He portrayed an FBI agent in Attack on Terror: The FBI vs. the Ku Klux Klan (1975).
Midway
as Captain Murray Arnold
Inspector Gadget
as Chief Quimby
You've Got Mail
as Nelson Fox
WarGames
as McKittrick
Stuart Little
as Dr. Beechwood
Tootsie
as Ron Carlisle
The Beverly Hillbillies
as Milburn Drysdale
The Towering Inferno
as Deputy Chief #1
Domino
as Drake Bishop
Dragnet
as Jerry Caesar
Nine to Five
as Franklin M. Hart Jr.
The Man with One Red Shoe
as Cooper
Clifford
as Gerald Ellis
Rules Don't Apply
as Raymond Holliday
Night of 100 Stars II
as Self
Recess: School's Out
as Principal Peter Prickly (voice)
This Property Is Condemned
as Salesman
Bite the Bullet
as Jack Parker
Pray TV
as Marvin Fleece
On Golden Pond
as Bill Ray
Young Doctors in Love
as Dr. Joseph Prang
Moonlight Mile
as Mike Mulcahey
Short Time
as Burt Simpson
Modern Problems
as Mark Winslow
Recess: Taking the Fifth Grade
as Principal Prickly (voice)
Cloak & Dagger
as Jack Flack / Hal Osborne
Rolling Thunder
as Maxwell
Viva Knievel!
as Ralph Thompson
The Scalphunters
as Jed
Happy 100th Birthday, Hollywood
as Self
Where the Red Fern Grows
as Grandpa
Exiled
as Lieutenant Kevin Stolper
How to Marry a Billionaire: A Christmas Tale
as John Kennedy
Melvin and Howard
as Judge Keith Hayes
Amos & Andrew
as Chief of Police Cecil Tolliver
The Muppets Take Manhattan
as Martin Price
Downhill Racer
as Mayo
Attack on Terror: The FBI vs. the Ku Klux Klan
as Paul Mathison
Recess Christmas: Miracle On Third Street
as Principal Peter Prickly
Callie & Son
as Randall Bordeaux
Hot to Trot
as Walter Sawyer
Where the Heart Is
as Stewart McBain
The Muppets Celebrate Jim Henson
as Self
Maneaters Are Loose!
as McCallum
Savage
as Ted Seligson
The Return of Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer
as Dabney Coleman
Target Earth
as Senator Ben Arnold
Nothing Personal
as Dickerson
My Date with the President's Daughter
as President George Richmond
Hard Four
as Spray Loomis
The Slender Thread
as Charlie
There Goes the Neighborhood
as Jeffrey Babitt
Cinderella Liberty
as Executive Officer
Kiss Me... Kill Me
as Capt. Logan
How to Beat the High Cost of Living
as Jack Heintzel
Bad Ronald
as Mr. Wood
A Witch's Way of Love
as Joel
When She Was Bad...
as Jack Wilson
Judicial Consent
as Charles Mayron
North Dallas Forty
as Emmett Hunter
I Love My Wife
as Frank Donnelly
Meet the Applegates
as Aunt Bea
Lincoln
as Stephen A. Douglas (voice)
Guilty of Innocence: The Lenell Geter Story
as Ed Sigel
More Than Friends
as Joshua 'Josh' Harrington
Still Working 9 to 5
as Self
The President's Plane Is Missing
as Sen. Bert Haines
The Brotherhood of the Bell
as Agent Shepard
Recess: All Growed Down
as Principal Prickley (voice)
The Dove
as Charles Huntley
Dying Room Only
as Bob Mitchell
Kiss My Act
as Henry
Giving It Up
as Johnathan Gallant
In the Line of Duty: Kidnapped
as Arthur Milo
Maybe Baby
as Hal
The Trouble with Girls
as Harrison Wilby
Plaza Suite
as Jesse Kiplinger
The Climb
as Mack
Murrow
as William Paley
The Other Side of the Mountain
as Dave McCoy
Never Forget
as William Cox
Taken
as Ethan Grover
Moving Target
The Case of the Baltimore Girls
as George Bates
Must Be Santa
Dan August: The Jealousy Factor
as Rick Bessett
The Making of Midway
as Self
Returning Home
as Al Stephenson
Char·ac·ter
as Self
Sworn to Silence
as Martin Costigan
House of Evil
Black Fist
as Heineken
Devil's Food
as Seymour Kecker