Dwayne Hickman
Encyclopedia
Dwayne Bernard Hickman is a former American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 actor and television executive at CBS.

He is known primarily for his "teenage" actor roles on television sitcoms. The naturally brown-headed Hickman is best known for playing Chuck MacDonald, Bob Collins's (played by Bob Cummings) crazy teenaged nephew, on the popular 1950s series, The Bob Cummings Show
The Bob Cummings Show
The Bob Cummings Show is an American sitcom starring Robert "Bob" Cummings which was produced from January 2, 1955 to September 15, 1959, and originally sponsored by R.J. Reynolds' Winston cigarettes...

(a.k.a. Love That Bob), and the blond title character in The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis
The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis
The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis is an American sitcom that aired on CBS from 1959 to 1963. The series and some episode scripts were adapted from a 1951 collection of short stories of the same name, written by Max Shulman, that also inspired the 1953 film The Affairs of Dobie Gillis with Debbie...

.

Personal life and career

Born in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

, Hickman is the younger brother of child actor Darryl Hickman
Darryl Hickman
Darryl Gerard Hickman is an American film and television actor, former television executive, and child star of the 1930s and 1940s.-Early life:...

. One of his earliest screen appearances was in the 1942 Our Gang
Our Gang
Our Gang, also known as The Little Rascals or Hal Roach's Rascals, was a series of American comedy short films about a group of poor neighborhood children and the adventures they had together. Created by comedy producer Hal Roach, the series is noted for showing children behaving in a relatively...

comedy Melodies Old and New. He and Darryl co-starred in an early episode of the syndicated
Television syndication
In broadcasting, syndication is the sale of the right to broadcast radio shows and television shows by multiple radio stations and television stations, without going through a broadcast network, though the process of syndication may conjure up structures like those of a network itself, by its very...

 military drama Men of Annapolis
Men of Annapolis
Men of Annapolis is a 41-episode half-hour syndicated drama television series in anthology format which aired from 1957–1958 and was hosted by the voice of Art Gilmore. Darryl Hickman appeared four times on the program as Dusty Rhodes, a fictitious midshipman at the United States Naval Academy in...

, filmed at the United States Naval Academy
United States Naval Academy
The United States Naval Academy is a four-year coeducational federal service academy located in Annapolis, Maryland, United States...

 in Annapolis
Annapolis, Maryland
Annapolis is the capital of the U.S. state of Maryland, as well as the county seat of Anne Arundel County. It had a population of 38,394 at the 2010 census and is situated on the Chesapeake Bay at the mouth of the Severn River, south of Baltimore and about east of Washington, D.C. Annapolis is...

, Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...

. As a teenager, he and Darryl also guest-starred in the same episode of The Lone Ranger
The Lone Ranger
The Lone Ranger is a fictional masked Texas Ranger who, with his Native American companion Tonto, fights injustice in the American Old West. The character has become an enduring icon of American culture....

.

Hickman gained wide notice when he played a regular role as Bob Cummings's character's nephew, Chuck, on the NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...

 situation comedy
Situation comedy
A situation comedy, often shortened to sitcom, is a genre of comedy that features characters sharing the same common environment, such as a home or workplace, accompanied with jokes as part of the dialogue...

 The Bob Cummings Show
The Bob Cummings Show
The Bob Cummings Show is an American sitcom starring Robert "Bob" Cummings which was produced from January 2, 1955 to September 15, 1959, and originally sponsored by R.J. Reynolds' Winston cigarettes...

in 1955. At the time, Hickman was a student at Loyola University (now known as Loyola Marymount University
Loyola Marymount University
Loyola Marymount University is a comprehensive co-educational private Roman Catholic university in the Jesuit and Marymount traditions located in Los Angeles, California, United States...

) in Los Angeles. Hickman became one of the first stars ever to have a breakout character
Breakout character
A breakout character is a fictional character in different episodes, books or other media that becomes the most popular, talked about, and imitated. Most often a breakout character in a television series captures the audience's imagination and helps to popularize the show, sometimes inadvertently...

 in the series.

Hickman considered Cummings a childhood television hero, and Hickman claimed to have no talent and to have learned everything from Cummings. He worked with and was friends with Cummings throughout the show's five seasons. This role probably led to his casting in the lead role in the CBS sitcom The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis. Frank Faylen
Frank Faylen
Frank Faylen was an American movie and television actor.Born Frank Ruf in St. Louis, Missouri, he began his acting career as an infant appearing with his vaudeville performing parents on stage...

 and Florida Friebus
Florida Friebus
Florida Friebus was an American writer and actress of stage, film, and television. Friebus's best-known roles were Winifred "Winnie" Gillis and Mrs...

 played his opposite-minded parents. Although at the show's debut the Dobie character was still a teenager in high school
High school
High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....

, Hickman was already 25 years old.

After playing Dobie for four years (with fellow former Loyola student Bob Denver
Bob Denver
Robert Osbourne "Bob" Denver was an American comedic actor known for his roles as Gilligan on the television series Gilligan's Island and the beatnik Maynard G. Krebs on the 1959–1963 TV series The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis.-Early life:Denver was born in New Rochelle, New York, and raised in...

 as his sidekick
Sidekick
A sidekick is a close companion who is generally regarded as subordinate to the one he accompanies. Some well-known fictional sidekicks are Don Quixote's Sancho Panza, Sherlock Holmes' Doctor Watson, The Lone Ranger's Tonto, The Green Hornet's Kato and Batman's Robin.-Origins:The origin of the...

, Maynard
Maynard G. Krebs
Maynard G. Krebs was the "beatnik" sidekick of the title character in the U.S. television sitcom The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis....

), Hickman found himself stereotyped as a "youngster
Youth
Youth is the time of life between childhood and adulthood . Definitions of the specific age range that constitutes youth vary. An individual's actual maturity may not correspond to their chronological age, as immature individuals could exist at all ages.-Usage:Around the world, the terms "youth",...

" just at the time of his life when he was really too old for such roles. He appeared in some minor beach films
Beach Party film
Beach party movies were an American 1960s genre of feature films created by American International Pictures with their surprise 1963 hit, Beach Party, and copied by virtually every other studio...

 and made an unsuccessful TV pilot
Television pilot
A "television pilot" is a standalone episode of a television series that is used to sell the show to a television network. At the time of its inception, the pilot is meant to be the "testing ground" to see if a series will be possibly desired and successful and therefore a test episode of an...

 for a program in which he was to play a young schoolteacher.

On June 23, 1960, Hickman appeared on NBC's The Ford Show, Starring Tennessee Ernie Ford
The Ford Show
The Ford Show is a half-hour comedy/variety program, starring singer and folk humorist Tennessee Ernie Ford, which aired in color on NBC television on Thursday evenings from October 4, 1956 to June 29, 1961....

. He and Annette Funicello
Annette Funicello
Annette Joanne Funicello is an American singer and actress. She was Walt Disney's most popular cast member of the original Mickey Mouse Club, and went on to appear in a series of beach party films.-Early life and early stardom:...

 appeared thereafter together in an episode of ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

's circus
Circus
A circus is commonly a travelling company of performers that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, unicyclists and other stunt-oriented artists...

 drama The Greatest Show on Earth
The Greatest Show on Earth (TV series)
The Greatest Show on Earth is an American drama series starring Jack Palance about the American circus, which aired on ABC from September 17, 1963, to April 28, 1964...

, starring Jack Palance
Jack Palance
Jack Palance , was an American actor. During half a century of film and television appearances, Palance was nominated for three Academy Awards, all as Best Actor in a Supporting Role, winning in 1991 for his role in City Slickers.-Early life:Palance, one of five children, was born Volodymyr...

. In 1965, Hickman appeared in the comedy film Cat Ballou
Cat Ballou
Cat Ballou is a 1965 comedy/Western film which tells the story of a woman who hires a famous gunman to protect her father's ranch, and later to avenge his murder, but finds that the man she hires is not what she expected...

along with Jane Fonda
Jane Fonda
Jane Fonda is an American actress, writer, political activist, former fashion model, and fitness guru. She rose to fame in the 1960s with films such as Barbarella and Cat Ballou. She has won two Academy Awards and received several other movie awards and nominations during more than 50 years as an...

 and Lee Marvin
Lee Marvin
Lee Marvin was an American film actor. Known for his gravelly voice, white hair and 6' 2" stature, Marvin at first did supporting roles, mostly villains, soldiers and other hardboiled characters, but after winning an Academy Award for Best Actor for his dual roles in Cat Ballou , he landed more...

.

Hickman found his future in entertainment to be behind the scenes, becoming involved in production roles. Later he became a programming executive at CBS, a role which he has since spoofed in several on-camera roles. He also worked as a director
Television director
A television director directs the activities involved in making a television program and is part of a television crew.-Duties:The duties of a television director vary depending on whether the production is live or recorded to video tape or video server .In both types of productions, the...

 on various television series, including Designing Women
Designing Women
Designing Women is an American television sitcom that centered on the working and personal lives of four Southern women and one man in an interior design firm in Atlanta, Georgia. It aired on the CBS television network from September 29, 1986 until May 24, 1993. The show was created by head writer...

and Head of the Class
Head of the Class
Head of the Class is an American sitcom that ran from 1986 to 1991 on the ABC television network. The series follows a group of gifted students in the Individualized Honors Program at the fictional Monroe High School in Manhattan, and their history teacher Charlie Moore...

.

He reprised his signature role of Dobie in two TV reunions, Whatever Happened to Dobie Gillis and Bring Me the Head of Dobie Gillis. His autobiography
Autobiography
An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...

is entitled Forever Dobie.

External links

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