By Tom Lisanti
Amongst the hoopla surrounding the recent passing of Michael
Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, Ed McMahon, Karl Malden,and a few others, one
death sadly slipped under the radar. Actor Don Edmonds died on May 29,
2009 from cancer. I interviewed him for my book, Hollywood Surf and Beach Movies: The First Wave, 1959-1969.Â
He was a great guy and we stayed in email contact for awhile. I had
the pleasure to finally meet him in person at a Chiller Convention in
New Jersey. Don was very humble regarding his acting and directing
careers and enjoyed talking with fans. Below is my tribute to him from
the book:
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Actor Don Edmonds was born in Kansas City, Missouri. His father
relocated the family to Long Beach, California in the thirties and got
work as a timekeeper at the shipyards. Soon the elder Edmond’s
entrepreneurial son began offering to shine shoes for military men at
the Pike an amusement park in Long Beach earning more money than his
father. The cute-looking youngster also had a talent for singing and
appeared in local USO shows singing "Mammy" in black face.Â
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As a teenager Edmonds spent his time hanging out on the beach.Â
"The first surfboard I ever saw was in 1950 when my friend Terry
McGelrand who was this wild guy brought one back from Hawaii. This
board must have been fifty feet long and it had no fin on it. We
loaded it up on his Woodie and took it down to the beach. We had
always been belly floppers before that. He took it out into the water
and stood up on it. We gasped, ‘Whoa, check that out!’"
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“We all began surfing after that," continues Don. "A couple of
legends came from our group. Hobie Alter had this shack out there
where he was experimenting with different kinds of weights and woods.Â
He began designing surfboards. Later he was famous for the Hobie Cat.Â
The other guy who I really grew up with was about three or four years
younger than us and he'd plead, ‘Can I hang around with you guys?’Â
We'd say, ‘No, go away! We're going to look for girls.’ He was always
the kid we'd chase away. His name was Bruce Brown who went on to make The Endless Summer."
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After graduating high school, Don Edmonds joined the service and
became a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne. While stationed at Fort
Bragg in North Carolina he joined the Spielhaus Players and appeared in
works by such renowned playwrights as Tennessee Williams and William
Inge. Returning to Long Beach, the lanky sandy-blonde hair surfer boy
was cast in several local theatrical productions before joining the
Estelle Harmon Actor’s Workshop where his classmates included BarBara
Luna, Bill Bixby, Millie Perkins and Ty Hardin. From there Edmonds was
able to finagle an agent to represent him and began landing work on
television most notably in five episodes of Playhouse 90.
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While working on Playhouse 90, Edmonds became fascinated
with directing. "I'd sit and just watch the director. I just knew I
wanted to direct. I never just hung out in my dressing room. Instead
I would come out on the set and observe gentlemen like Ralph Nelson and
John Frankenheimer work. They were young guys back then making their
bones too. This was the only schooling that I had. I was just so
interested in the directing process."
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