Claude Ennis "Jack" Starrett Jr. (November 2, 1936 – March 27, 1989) was an American

actor An actor (masculine/gender-neutral), or actress (feminine), is a person who portrays a character in a production. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. ...

and

film director A film director or filmmaker is a person who controls a film's artistic and dramatic aspects and visualizes the screenplay (or script) while guiding the film crew and actors in the fulfillment of that Goal, vision. The director has a key role ...

.Staff report (March 29, 1989). Jack Starrett, 52; Adventure Film Actor, Director. ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

'' Starrett is perhaps best known for his role as ''Gabby Johnson'', a

parody A parody is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satire, satirical or irony, ironic imitation. Often its subject is an Originality, original work or some aspect of it (theme/content, author, style, e ...

George "Gabby" Hayes George Francis "Gabby" Hayes (May 7, 1885 – February 9, 1969) was an American actor. He began as something of a leading man and a character player, but he was best known for his numerous appearances in B-Western (genre), Western film series as ...

, in the 1974 film ''

Blazing Saddles ''Blazing Saddles'' is a 1974 American satirical postmodernist Western black comedy film directed by Mel Brooks, who co-wrote the screenplay with Andrew Bergman, Richard Pryor, Norman Steinberg and Alan Uger, based on a story treatment by Be ...

'' and is also known for his role as the brutal policeman Art Galt in the 1982

action film The action film is a film genre that predominantly features chase sequences, fights, shootouts, explosions, and stunt work. The specifics of what constitutes an action film has been in scholarly debate since the 1980s. While some scholars such as D ...

First Blood ''First Blood'' is a 1982 American war action film starring Sylvester Stallone as Vietnam War veteran John Rambo. Directed by Ted Kotcheff, the film was co-written by Michael Kozoll, William Sackheim, and Stallone, deriving from the 1972 no ...

''. He also played the cruel foreman Swick in '' The River'' (1984). Starrett acted in the biker films '' The Born Losers'', '' Hells Angels on Wheels'' (both from 1967), ''

Angels from Hell ''Angels from Hell'' is a 1968 biker film directed by Bruce Kessler and starring Tom Stern and Arlene Martel. It was the first film produced by Joe Solomon's Fanfare Films, a firm Solomon had created with the profits from three previous biker ...

'' (1968) and '' Hell's Bloody Devils'' (1970), and directed two more: ''Run, Angel, Run'' in 1969 and '' Nam's Angels'' (1970) as well as the

horror film Horror is a film genre that seeks to elicit physical or psychological fear in its viewers. Horror films often explore dark subject matter and may deal with Transgressive art, transgressive topics or themes. Broad elements of the genre include Mo ...

'' Race with the Devil'' (1975) - that was filmed in his home state of Texas - in which he also played a gas station attendant.

Life and career

Starrett was raised in

Refugio, Texas Refugio ( ) is a town in Refugio County, of which it is the county seat, in the U.S. state of Texas. The population was 2,712 as of the 2020 Census. Refugio is the birthplace of Baseball Hall of Fame member Nolan Ryan. Geography Refugio is lo ...

and worked in the

oil field A petroleum reservoir or oil and gas reservoir is a subsurface accumulation of hydrocarbons contained in porous or fractured rock formations. Such reservoirs form when kerogen (ancient plant matter) is created in surrounding rock by the prese ...

s before coming to Hollywood.(April 1, 1989). Jack Starrett, Actor/Director in films, TV. ''

San Jose Mercury News ''The Mercury News'' (formerly ''San Jose Mercury News'', often locally known as ''The Merc'') is a morning daily newspaper published in San Jose, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. It is published by the Bay Area News Group, a subsidia ...

'' He starred in the 1961 film '' Like Father Like Son'' as Coach Jennings, and later reprised the role in '' The Young Sinner'' in 1965 and '' Like Father Like Son'' in 1987. Valerie Starrett, his wife at one time, said Jack had always wished to direct rather than act. He made an uncredited first attempt at direction when the original director of '' The Girls from Thunder Strip'' needed assistance. Throughout his career, Starrett directed

feature films A feature film or feature-length film (often abbreviated to feature), also called a theatrical film, is a film ( motion picture, "movie" or simply “picture”) with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole presentation ...

and episodes of television programs. In addition, he made guest appearances on TV shows including ''

Hill Street Blues ''Hill Street Blues'' is an American serial police procedural television series that aired on NBC in prime-time from January 15, 1981, to May 12, 1987, for 146 episodes. The show chronicles the lives of the Metropolitan Police Department staff ...

'', ''

Hunter Hunting is the human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, and killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to obtain the animal's body for meat and useful animal products ( fur/ hide, bone/tusks, ...

'', ''

The A-Team ''The A-Team'' is an American Action television, action television series that ran on NBC from January 23, 1983, to March 8, 1987, about a fictional team of former United States Army Special Forces who work as mercenaries while on the run from ...

'', and '' Knight Rider'' (in which he made three guest appearances as different characters.) Starrett starred in three short films directed by Tony Schweikle. Starrett and Schweikle stayed close friends until Starrett's death. He played the mumbling Gabby Johnson in

Mel Brooks Melvin James Brooks (né Kaminsky; born June 28, 1926) is an American actor, comedian, filmmaker, and songwriter. With a career spanning over seven decades, he is known as a writer and director of a variety of successful broad farces and parodie ...

' 1974 film ''

'', which was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

and was selected for preservation in the

National Film Registry The National Film Registry (NFR) is the United States National Film Preservation Board's (NFPB) collection of films selected for preservation (library and archival science), preservation, each selected for its cultural, historical, and aestheti ...

Death

Starrett died from

liver failure Liver failure is the inability of the liver to perform its normal synthetic and metabolic functions as part of normal physiology. Two forms are recognised, acute and chronic (cirrhosis). Recently, a third form of liver failure known as acute- ...

Sherman Oaks, California Sherman Oaks (founded in 1927) is a neighborhood of the city of Los Angeles, California within the San Fernando Valley region. The neighborhood includes a portion of the Santa Monica Mountains, which gives Sherman Oaks a lower population density ...

at the age of 52. According to his sister, he had been ill for "some time". At the time of his death he was married to Valerie Starrett.

Filmography

Film

Director * '' Run, Angel, Run!'' (1969) * ''House of Zodiac'' (1969) * '' Nam's Angels'' (1970) * '' Cry Blood, Apache'' (1970) * '' The Strange Vengeance of Rosalie'' (1972) * '' Slaughter'' (1972) * '' Cleopatra Jones'' (1973) * ''

The Gravy Train ''The Gravy Train'', also commonly known as ''The Dion Brothers'', is a 1974 American crime film, crime-comedy film directed by Jack Starrett, written by Terrence Malick (under the pseudonym David Whitney) and Bill Kerby, and starring Stacy Kea ...

'' (1974) * '' Race with the Devil'' (1975) * ''The New Spartans'' (1975) * '' A Small Town in Texas'' (1976) * '' Hollywood Man'' (1976) * '' Walking Tall: Final Chapter'' (1977) * ''Kiss My Grits'' (1982) Actor

Television

TV series

Director Actor

TV movies

Director * ''Night Chase'' (1970) * ''Roger and Hary: The Mitera Target'' (1977) * ''Nowhere to Hide'' (1977) * ''Thaddeus Rose and Eddie'' (1978) * ''Big Bob Johnson and His Fantastic Speed Circus'' (1978) * '' Mr. Horn'' (1979) * '' Survival of Dana'' (1979) Actor

References

External links

*
Jack Starrett
at Find A Grave {{DEFAULTSORT:Starrett, Jack 1936 births 1989 deaths American male film actors American male television actors Deaths from kidney failure in California People from Refugio, Texas Film directors from Texas Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills) 20th-century American male actors Blaxploitation film directors