The laconic character actor Owen Bush was born on November 10, 1921 in Savannah, Missouri. He was a popular radio and television announcer in nearby Kansas City during the 1940s and 1950s, working on several stations simultaneously. Bush was one of hundreds of Kansas Citians with acting talent who found work on local radio and TV stations, and on the stage in civic theater presentations. Other nam ...
show all The laconic character actor Owen Bush was born on November 10, 1921 in Savannah, Missouri. He was a popular radio and television announcer in nearby Kansas City during the 1940s and 1950s, working on several stations simultaneously. Bush was one of hundreds of Kansas Citians with acting talent who found work on local radio and TV stations, and on the stage in civic theater presentations. Other names include James Lantz, Leonard Belove, Arthur Ellison, Keith Painton, and Kermit Echols. As a way of earning extra money and also getting a chance to appear in a motion picture, these local actors would appear in hundreds of short-length industrial films, made to promote a business, a service, or a government function, being made by the Calvin Company of Kansas City, the world's largest industrial film producer and 16mm film laboratory. Owen Bush was no exception. He appeared in at least forty-five to fifty Calvin industrial films, and several of them were directed by Robert Altman, the famous filmmaker, who got his start making films at Calvin. Owen is one of the soldiers in the 1955 Altman short "The Magic Bond," in an opening sequence where future Altman trademarks overlapping dialogue and near-constant camera movement are used. Also, when Robert Altman made his first feature film, "The Delinquents," shot in Kansas City in 1955, Owen is one of the men in the bar in the opening scene who is told to "scoot over" across the bar (uncredited).
In any case, Owen stayed in Kansas City for a few more years. Many of the Kansas Citians, such as Arthur Ellison and Keith Painton, and Calvin filmmakers such as Altman, writer Richard Sarafian, editor Louis Lombardo, and assistant director Richard Peabody, were getting more theatrical film work and some were moving out to Hollywood. William Frawley, who played Fred Mertz on "I Love Lucy," was a good friend of Owen's after the two appeared in a Calvin film together, and by 1958 Frawley suggested that Owen come out to Hollywood. Owen agreed, and moved out to California, where he soon became a well-known radio and TV personality, and then he began to get some acting work.
Through the 1960s and 1970s, Owen consistently appeared in small and supporting roles in numerous film productions and played countless guest-starring roles in popular television programs, including "Bonanza," "The Andy Griffith Show," "Get Smart," and others. Several episodes of "Bonanza" that he appeared in were directed by his old Kansas City friend Robert Altman, who was now out in Hollywood as well, about eight years away from the huge success of "M*A*S*H." Owen was also involved (more or less) in a huge argument over an Altman-directed episode of the one-season-only "Bus Stop" TV show, when he played an old grocery store owner in a violent scene where Fabian tosses him over a counter and proceeds to bludgeon Owen. Some political people and TV executives were shocked by the episodes's violence and banned it from being aired ever again, but not without many in-depth discussions about TV violence and its effect on children especially, in possibly causing juvenile delinquency.
This didn't hurt Owen's career of course. Nobody really paid any attention to the actors themselves. Owen's TV work became more infrequent as time went on, as he spent more time appearing in feature films. After quite a few years, he had finally been able to be recognized by many as a very talented, veteran character actor. At the time of his death in 2001, Owen was well-respected as one of the best of the many obscure veteran character actors and guest-star performers. Everybody seems to recognize his face, but not his name. That is what a character actor often is supposed to be like.
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