I should ask Douglass Daniel about scripts written in '82 in anticipation of a sixth LOU GRANT season that never made it into production; would be interesting if some of those could be turned up to gauge the intended direction of the show at that point in time.
Born just a bit too late to fit into the second decade of big-screen American noir, Ed can be seen in several TV noir episodes (sporting what is now a most incongruous full head of hair) beginning in the late 50s; he made the TV rounds in the early 60s and can be found on most of the major crime/anthology series, including NAKED CITY, THE UNTOUCHABLES, both versions of the Alfred Hitchcock show, THE FUGITIVE, and even Leslie Stevens' wacky pilot for a never-greenlighted Richard Egan series that was eventually shown as a TV-movie entitled FANFARE FOR A DEATH SCENE.
After playing a number of detectives on TV and in movies, Ed's big break came on THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW, where the Lou Grant character first appeared. He had a fantastic run with that character, in both its incarnations--and had the Emmy awards to further confirm it.
A look at Ed's IMDB page shows that he remained incredibly active right up to his passing. It looks as though we'll get to see him in action a few more times before his last credit rolls.
I'll be queuing up "Hollywood," the noir tribute episode of LOU GRANT, with its all-star cast of film noir luminaries, in the next day or so and will toss up a fresh review of it here shortly. As you might expect, Ed handled the voice-over for the episode, and did a bang-up job.
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