Ned Beatty

Season 7, Episode 704

Original Airdate: January 7, 2001

Ned Beatty was born on July 6, 1937 in Louisville, Kentucky. His career began at the age of ten singing in barbershop quartets and gospel choirs to earn spending money. His early career aspirations were to become a preacher but instead turned to acting after appearing in a high school play.

He spent the first two decades of his career as a stage actor performing in such theaters as the Barter Theater in Abingdon, VA, the Erie Playhouse in Pennsylvania and the prestigious Arena Stage Company in Washington, DC.

While on Broadway in The Great White Hope, Beatty was noticed by director John Boorman and was soon cast in the backwoods shocker Deliverance (1971) as the chubby salesman who is raped by the mountain stalkers. Since then, he has found his niche as a supporting actor and has become one of those performers who seems to appear in every film that is released. In 1976, he was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in Network for his portrayal of Arthur Jenson, owner of the fictional UTN network.

Beatty also earned 2 Emmy nominations for his numerous television movie and guest appearances. He appeared on the critically acclaimed series Homicide and had a recurring role as Dan's dad on the hit show Roseanne.

His big screen credits include Nashville (1975), All The President's Men (1976), Superman (1978), Superman II (1980) and The Big Easy (1987). In the 1990's, Beatty appeared in Hear My Song (1991) for which he received a Golden Globe nomination, A Prelude to a Kiss (1992), Rudy (1994), He Got Game (1998), Life (1999) and Cookie's Fortune (1999).

Beatty recently won critical acclaim for his outstanding performance as groundskeeper Murph in Tom Gilroy's debut film Spring Forward (2000). The film also stars Liev Schreiber and is unique in that it was shot in sequence over a one year period.