Celebrity Death: Gunsmoke actor James Arness dead in LA celebrity home?

Celebrity Death!

Gunsmoke actor James Arness dead in LA celebrity home?

Immortalized in Toby Keith’s song, Should’ve Been a Cowboy, legendary actor James Arness, passed away quietly Friday, June 3, in his Los Angeles celebrity home. Known most for his role as Marshal Dillon on Gunsmoke from 1955 to 1975, he was the epitome of a Hollywood cowboy, and also starred in dozens of movies, some as recent as 1994. James Arness (brother of late Mission Impossible actor, Peter Graves), died of natural causes at age 88. During Arness’s career, he shared screen time with numerous famous actors, including Alec Baldwin, John Wayne, Harrison Ford, Burt Reynolds, Dennis Weaver, and Charles Bronson. The Minnesota-born actor fit the ideal stereotype for a cowboy, with his quiet demeanor and massive (for the time) 6-foot, 6-inch stature. The cultural icon has a star on the walk of fame, three Emmy Award nominations, a TVLand Nomination and is a 1967 Western Heritage and 1986 Golden Boot award recipient.

Arness landed the Gunsmoke role when John Wayne turned it down and recommended him for the slot. The longest-running television drama, focused on 1873 Dodge City, Kansas, and its lawmen and criminals. At one time during production, there were 30 competitive ‘cowboy’ television shows, and Gunsmoke outlasted them all, with episodes still playing on TVLand. The show was set during a timeframe in which our nation thrived on a green lifestyle, with very little industry and renewable energy coming from the efforts of humans and animals. It was a time in which vegetable gardens and organic methods were the norm for families on the frontier, and virtually every tool and resource was renewed or recycled. The show itself included horses as a staple in its scenes. There are no records of any negative treatment of animals on the show, and the stars seemed to treat them similar to true pioneers of the Old West: as reliable sidekicks.

A decorated World War II veteran, James Arness was awarded the Bronze Star; the Purple Heart (wounded at Anzio); the European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal with three bronze campaign stars; the World War II Victory Medal and the Combat Infantryman Badge. After the war, he started his career as a radio announcer in Minnesota in 1945. Then in the 1950’s, he signed a contract with John Wayne’s production company.

The family has asked that fans honor his memory with donations to United Cerebral Palsy in his name, a cause for which he was passionate

James Arness, tall, quiet Marshal Dillon of TV’s ‘Gunsmoke,’ dies at 88

James Arness, who presided over the frontier town of Dodge City as television’s most enduring western hero, the laconic, fair-minded and incorruptible Marshal Matt Dillon of the two-decade-long series “Gunsmoke,” died June 3 at his home in Los Angeles at 88. The cause of death was not reported.
Mr. Arness, who was a rugged 6-foot-7, stood tall in the dusty streets of Dodge City, Kan., portraying a U.S. marshal whose badge represented more than just the force of law. He was the embodiment of quiet moral authority, a sensitive arbiter of conflict in a rough-and-ready cow town — “Gomorrah of the plains, they call it,” as he said in the show’s first episode. Only when pushed to the limit would Marshal Dillon pull his six-gun from its holster.

James Arness, the 6-foot-6 actor who towered over the television landscape for two decades as righteous Dodge City lawman Matt Dillon in "Gunsmoke" died Friday. (June 3)

When “Gunsmoke” premiered in 1955, it was considered a new breed of “adult western,” with well-drawn characters and complex plots that, despite its name, took the show beyond outlaws and gunfights.
“What made us different from other westerns,” Mr. Arness told the Associated Press in 2002, “was the fact that ‘Gunsmoke’ wasn’t just action and a lot of shooting; they were character-study shows.”
Mr. Arness, who was recommended for the role of Matt Dillon by his friend John Wayne, was the center of an ensemble that included Milburn Stone as the gentle, scholarly Doc Adams; Amanda Blake as Kitty Russell — “Miss Kitty” — who ran the Long Branch saloon; and Dennis Weaver as Mr. Arness’s limping deputy sidekick, Chester Goode. After Weaver left the show in 1964, Ken Curtis joined the cast as the memorable comic character, Festus Haggen.
“Gunsmoke” aired on CBS for 20 years, but in Dodge City it was forever 1873. Other westerns came and went, but “Gunsmoke” ranked among the most popular programs year after year. When it was canceled in 1975, it was the last western on TV at the time.
No other scripted shows have run as long except “The Simpsons,” which reached its 20th year in 2009, and “Law & Order,” which left the air last year after 20 seasons. Neither show is within 150 episodes of “Gunsmoke’s” total of 635.
As the show evolved, the opening credits changed from a main-street shootout to a scene of Marshal Dillon galloping his horse across the prairie. His relationship with Miss Kitty developed to the point that they shared a kiss during one episode in 1973. They never married, though, and the social order of Dodge City remained intact.
“Matt Dillon is still the all-time, all-star marshal, pure, square-shouldered square-shooter, yet he never hogs the screen,” New York Daily News culture critic Gerald Nachman wrote in 1973, summing up the appeal of “Gunsmoke” and Mr. Arness’s archetypal central character. “Half the time you hardly know he’s in town, but he casts a tall shadow.”
James King Aurness — he dropped the “u” after arriving in Hollywood — was born May 23, 1923, in Minneapolis. His younger brother was actor Peter Graves, the star of the 1960s series “Mission Impossible” and the comic “Airplane!” films. Graves died last year at 83.