Michael J. Pollard
Encyclopedia
Early life
Born Michael John Pollack, Jr. in PassaicPassaic, New Jersey
Passaic is a city in Passaic County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city had a total population of 69,781, maintaining its status as the 15th largest municipality in New Jersey with an increase of 1,920 residents from the 2000 Census population of 67,861...
, New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
, he is the son of Sonia (née
Married and maiden names
A married name is the family name adopted by a person upon marriage. When a person assumes the family name of her spouse, the new name replaces the maiden name....
Dubanowich) and Michael John Pollack. He attended the Montclair Academy and the Actors Studio
Actors Studio
The Actors Studio is a membership organization for professional actors, theatre directors and playwrights at 432 West 44th Street in the Clinton neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded October 5, 1947, by Elia Kazan, Cheryl Crawford, Robert Lewis and Anna Sokolow who provided...
.
Career
In 1959, he played Homer McCauley, the dramatic lead, in a television adaptation of William SaroyanWilliam Saroyan
William Saroyan was an Armenian American dramatist and author. The setting of many of his stories and plays is the center of Armenian-American life in California in his native Fresno.-Early years:...
's novel, The Human Comedy, production narrated by Burgess Meredith
Burgess Meredith
Oliver Burgess Meredith , known professionally as Burgess Meredith, was an American actor in theatre, film, and television, who also worked as a director...
.
Also in 1959, Pollard, at twenty, appeared in the episode "The Unknown Town" of David Hedison
David Hedison
Albert David Hedison, Jr. is an Armenian-American film, television, and stage actor. He was billed as Al Hedison in his early film work. In 1959, when he was cast in the role of Victor Sebastian in the short-lived espionage television series Five Fingers, NBC insisted that he change his name...
's 16-segment 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...
espionage
Espionage
Espionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
series, Five Fingers
Five Fingers (TV series)
For other uses see 5 Fingers Five Fingers is an NBC adventure/drama series set in Europe during the Cold War loosely based on the 1952 film 5 Fingers, starring James Mason and Danielle Darrieux...
.
Pollard created the non-singing role of Hugo Peabody in the Original Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
cast of the 1960 musical comedy Bye Bye Birdie (lyrics by Lee Adams
Lee Adams
Lee Richard Adams is an American lyricist best known for his musical theatre collaboration with Charles Strouse.Born in Mansfield, Ohio, Adams received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Ohio State University and a Master's from Columbia University.Adams won Tony Awards in 1961 for Bye Bye Birdie...
and music by Charles Strouse
Charles Strouse
Charles Strouse is an American composer and lyricist.-Life and career:Strouse was born and raised in New York City, the son of Ira and Ethel Strouse...
). Hugo is a high-school student, boyfriend of Kim McAfee (played by Susan Watson
Susan Watson
Susan Watson is an American actress and singer best known for her roles in musical theatre.Watson's first professional role was Velma in the original West End production of West Side Story in 1958. She created the role of Luisa in The Fantasticks and then played Kim on Broadway in Bye Bye Birdie,...
on Broadway), who becomes jealous of Kim's infatuation with rock star Conrad Birdie. In the 1963 film version
Bye Bye Birdie (film)
Bye Bye Birdie is a 1963 musical comedy film from Columbia Pictures. It is a film adaptation of the stage production of the same name. The screenplay was written by Michael Stewart and Irving Brecher, with music by Charles Strouse and lyrics by Lee Adams....
, Hugo became a singing role and was played by Bobby Rydell
Bobby Rydell
Bobby Rydell is an American professional singer, mainly of rock and roll music. In the early 1960s he was considered a so-called "teen idol"...
.
In 1962, he appeared in the short-lived Robert Young
Robert Young (actor)
Robert George Young was an American television, film, and radio actor, best known for his leading roles as Jim Anderson, the father of Father Knows Best and as physician Marcus Welby in Marcus Welby, M.D. .-Early life:Born in Chicago, Illinois, Young was the son of an Irish immigrant father...
comedy
Comedy
Comedy , as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse or work generally intended to amuse by creating laughter, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in...
and drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...
series Window on Main Street
Window on Main Street
Window on Main Street is an American comedy-drama series starring Robert Young, which aired on CBS during the 1961-1962 season. The series was created by Roswell Rogers and produced by series star Robert Young.-Synopsis:...
on CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
in an episode entitled "The Boy Who Got Too Many Laughs".
Pollard appeared in episode #2-30 of The Andy Griffith Show
The Andy Griffith Show
The Andy Griffith Show is an American sitcom first televised by CBS between October 3, 1960, and April 1, 1968. Andy Griffith portrays a widowed sheriff in the fictional small community of Mayberry, North Carolina...
which originally aired on April 30, 1962, as Barney Fife
Barney Fife
Bernard "Barney" Fife is a fictional character in the American television program The Andy Griffith Show, portrayed by comic actor Don Knotts. Barney Fife is a deputy sheriff in the slow paced, sleepy southern community of Mayberry, North Carolina...
's clumsy young cousin, Virgil, who stops by for a visit and manages to wreak havoc at the courthouse.
In 1963 he appeared on 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 Channing
Channing (TV series)
Channing is an American drama series that aired on American Broadcasting Company from September 18, 1963 to April 8, 1964...
, a drama about college
College
A college is an educational institution or a constituent part of an educational institution. Usage varies in English-speaking nations...
life starring Jason Evers
Jason Evers
Jason Evers was an American actor.Evers was born Herb Evers in New York City, New York. After quitting high school to join the United States Army, Evers was so inspired by stars like John Wayne that he decided to try acting...
and Henry Jones
Henry Jones (actor)
Henry Burk Jones was an American actor of stage, film and television.Jones was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of Helen and John Francis Xavier Jones. He was the grandson of Pennsylvania Representative Henry Burk...
.
In 1963 he also played the role of Digby in the movie "Summer Magic, starring Hayley Mills.
In 1964 he played the role of Cyrus in episode 108, "Journey for Three," of the television series Gunsmoke.
In 1965, he played the role of "Jingles" in the episode called "The Princess and the Paupers" on a TV Series called "Honey West".
In 1966 (at age 26) he played the role of an alien boy in Lost in Space
Lost in Space
Lost in Space is a science fiction TV series created and produced by Irwin Allen, filmed by 20th Century Fox Television, and broadcast on CBS. The show ran for three seasons, with 83 episodes airing between September 15, 1965, and March 6, 1968...
.
Also in 1966, he played the role of Bernie in the I Spy episode "Trial by Treehouse" (airing October 19, 1966), alongside series stars Bill Cosby
Bill Cosby
William Henry "Bill" Cosby, Jr. is an American comedian, actor, author, television producer, educator, musician and activist. A veteran stand-up performer, he got his start at various clubs, then landed a starring role in the 1960s action show, I Spy. He later starred in his own series, the...
and Robert Culp
Robert Culp
Robert Martin Culp was an American actor, scriptwriter, voice actor and director, widely known for his work in television. Culp first earned an international reputation for his role as Kelly Robinson on I Spy , the espionage series in which he and co-star Bill Cosby played a pair of secret agents...
with guest stars Cicely Tyson
Cicely Tyson
Cicely Tyson is an American actress. A successful stage actress, Tyson is also known for her Oscar-nominated role in the film Sounder and the television movies The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman and Roots....
and Raymond St. Jacques
Raymond St. Jacques
Raymond St. Jacques was an American actor.-Career:St. Jacques was born James Arthur Johnson in Hartford, Connecticut, the son of Vivienne Johnson, a medical technician...
.
In Star Trek Season 1 Episode 8 "Miri", at age 27 he played a barely pre-pubescent boy, leader of a band of orphaned children.
In 1967 he played the supporting role of C. W. Moss in Arthur Penn
Arthur Penn
Arthur Hiller Penn was an American film director and producer with a career as a theater director as well. Penn amassed a critically acclaimed body of work throughout the 1960s and 1970s.-Early years:...
's Bonnie and Clyde
Bonnie and Clyde
Bonnie Elizabeth Parker and Clyde Chestnut Barrow were well-known outlaws, robbers, and criminals who traveled the Central United States with their gang during the Great Depression. Their exploits captured the attention of the American public during the "public enemy era" between 1931 and 1934...
alongside Warren Beatty
Warren Beatty
Warren Beatty born March 30, 1937) is an American actor, producer, screenwriter and director. He has received a total of fourteen Academy Award nominations, winning one for Best Director in 1982. He has also won four Golden Globe Awards including the Cecil B. DeMille Award.-Early life and...
, Faye Dunaway
Faye Dunaway
Faye Dunaway is an American actress.Dunaway won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in Network after receiving previous nominations for the critically acclaimed films Bonnie and Clyde and Chinatown...
, Gene Hackman
Gene Hackman
Eugene Allen "Gene" Hackman is an American actor and novelist.Nominated for five Academy Awards, winning two, Hackman has also won three Golden Globes and two BAFTAs in a career that spanned five decades. He first came to fame in 1967 with his performance as Buck Barrow in Bonnie and Clyde...
, and Estelle Parsons
Estelle Parsons
Estelle Margaret Parsons is an American theatre, film and television actress and occasional theatrical director.After studying law, Parsons became a singer before deciding to pursue a career in acting. She worked for the television program Today and made her stage debut in 1961...
, for which he received Academy Award
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
and Golden Globe Award
Golden Globe Award
The Golden Globe Award is an accolade bestowed by the 93 members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association recognizing excellence in film and television, both domestic and foreign...
nominations for Best Supporting Actor and won a BAFTA Award for Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles. The role led to his joke candidacy for president (see below).
"Michael J. Pollard For President"
In 1968, DJ-turned-singer Jim LoweJim Lowe
Jim Lowe is an American singer-songwriter, best known for his 1956 number-one hit record, "The Green Door". He also served as a disc jockey and radio host and personality, and has been considered an expert on the popular music of the 1940s and 1950s.-Biography:Born in Springfield, Missouri, Lowe...
(who hit the top of the charts in 1956 with "The Green Door") recorded "Michael J. Pollard for President" on the Buddah Records
Buddah Records
Buddah Records was founded in 1967 in New York City. The label was born out of Kama Sutra Records, an MGM Records-distributed label, which remained a key imprint following Buddah's founding...
label. ( Listen here) The record, which contains sound bites from Robert Kennedy and Chicago mayor Richard Daley
Richard Daley
Richard Daley may refer to:*Richard J. Daley , Mayor of Chicago , father of Richard M. Daley*Richard M. Daley , Mayor of Chicago , son of Richard J. Daley...
, extolled Pollard's qualifications for the Oval Office: "Those who saw him as C. W. Moss/Know this hippie is really boss!" Pollard himself can be heard at the end of the song: "Furthermore, if I'm elected for President...hey, man! President of what...?" The 45 failed to make the record charts, possibly because the use of Kennedy's voice on a comedy record after his death
Robert F. Kennedy assassination
The assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, a United States Senator and brother of assassinated President John F. Kennedy, took place shortly after midnight on June 5, 1968, in Los Angeles, California...
was considered to be in poor taste.
In 1970 he had a starring role as Little Fauss in the cult motorcycle racing movie Little Fauss and Big Halsy
Little Fauss and Big Halsy
Little Fauss and Big Halsy is a 1970 film directed by Sidney J. Furie, starring Robert Redford and Michael J. Pollard, also featuring Lauren Hutton, Noah Beery Jr and Lucille Benson....
with Robert Redford
Robert Redford
Charles Robert Redford, Jr. , better known as Robert Redford, is an American actor, film director, producer, businessman, environmentalist, philanthropist, and founder of the Sundance Film Festival. He has received two Oscars: one in 1981 for directing Ordinary People, and one for Lifetime...
, Noah Beery Jr., Lucille Benson
Lucille Benson
Lucille Benson was an American actress known for her roles in commercials, television, and movies in the 1970s and 1980s.-Personal life:...
, and Lauren Hutton
Lauren Hutton
Lauren Hutton is an American model and actress. She is best-known for her starring roles in the movies American Gigolo and Lassiter, and also for her fashion modeling career.-Personal life:...
.
Pollard is noted for his short stature, which had him playing child roles well into his twenties (including on Star Trek
Star Trek: The Original Series
Star Trek is an American science fiction television series created by Gene Roddenberry, produced by Desilu Productions . Star Trek was telecast on NBC from September 8, 1966, through June 3, 1969...
, where he played one of the inhabitants of the planet of children in the episode "Miri") and resulted in a recurring role as the diminutive trans-dimensional imp Mister Mxyzptlk
Mister Mxyzptlk
Mr. Mxyzptlk , sometimes called Mxy, is a fictional impish supervillain who appears in DC Comics' Superman comic books.He was created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, and first appeared in Superman #30 . He is usually presented as a trickster, in the classical mythological sense, in that he enjoys...
in two episodes of the Superboy
Superboy (TV series)
Superboy is a half-hour live-action television series based on the fictional DC Comics comic book character Kal-El's early years as Superboy. The show ran from 1988–1992 in syndication...
television series. He also appeared in a memorable first season episode of Irwin Allen's Lost In Space
Lost in Space
Lost in Space is a science fiction TV series created and produced by Irwin Allen, filmed by 20th Century Fox Television, and broadcast on CBS. The show ran for three seasons, with 83 episodes airing between September 15, 1965, and March 6, 1968...
series as a mysterious boy who lives on the other side of all mirrors. Adept at comic roles with an odd edge, he had a stand-out bit part in the classic Norman Jewison Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
comedy The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming
The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming
The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming is an American comedy film. Based on the Nathaniel Benchley novel The Off-Islanders, the film was directed by Norman Jewison and adapted for the screen by William Rose....
. He also played Packy in Hannibal Brooks
Hannibal Brooks
Hannibal Brooks is a 1969 British war film about a Prisoner of war attempt to escape from Nazi Germany to Switzerland during World War II, accompanied by an Asian Elephant. It stars Oliver Reed, Michael J. Pollard and Wolfgang Preiss...
.
He starred in the film Dirty Little Billy (1972), set in Coffeyville, Kansas, portrayed Billy the Kid at the beginning of his criminal career.
Pollard had a key supporting role in the 1980 cult film Melvin and Howard
Melvin and Howard
Melvin and Howard is a 1980 American comedy-drama film directed by Jonathan Demme. The screenplay by Bo Goldman was inspired by real-life Utah service station owner Melvin Dummar, who was listed as the beneficiary of USD$156 million in a will allegedly handwritten by Howard Hughes that was...
about the Melvin Dummar
Melvin Dummar
Melvin Earl Dummar is a Utah man who earned national attentionwhen he claimed to have saved reclusive business tycoon Howard Hughes in a Nevada desert in 1967, and to have been awarded part of Hughes' vast estate. Dummar's story was adapted into the Academy Award winning film Melvin and Howard, in...
/Howard Hughes
Howard Hughes
Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. was an American business magnate, investor, aviator, engineer, film producer, director, and philanthropist. He was one of the wealthiest people in the world...
/Mormon Will controversy.
In 1988, Pollard played the role of Herman (the homeless guy who thought Bill Murray
Bill Murray
William James "Bill" Murray is an American actor and comedian. He first gained national exposure on Saturday Night Live in which he earned an Emmy Award and later went on to star in a number of critically and commercially successful comedic films, including Caddyshack , Ghostbusters , and...
was Richard Burton
Richard Burton
Richard Burton, CBE was a Welsh actor. He was nominated seven times for an Academy Award, six of which were for Best Actor in a Leading Role , and was a recipient of BAFTA, Golden Globe and Tony Awards for Best Actor. Although never trained as an actor, Burton was, at one time, the highest-paid...
) in the movie Scrooged
Scrooged
Scrooged is a 1988 American comedy film, a modernization of Charles Dickens' novella, A Christmas Carol. The film was produced and directed by Richard Donner, and the cinematography was by Michael Chapman. The screenplay was written by Mitch Glazer and Michael O'Donoghue...
.
1989 he played 'Owen' the inventor of super weapons and a super car in Tango and Cash, starring Kurt Russell and Sylvester Stallone.
Actor Michael J. Fox
Michael J. Fox
Michael J. Fox, OC is a Canadian American actor, author, producer, activist and voice-over artist. With a film and television career spanning from the late 1970s, Fox's roles have included Marty McFly from the Back to the Future trilogy ; Alex P...
has stated that he adopted the J. in his name as a homage to Pollard.
In 1992 he starred in an episode of 6th season of Ray Bradbury Theater The Handler where he played a mortician who tries to give his clients a little extra treatment that he thinks they should have.
Pollard has continued to work in film and television into the 21st century, including his appearance as "Stucky" in the 2003 Rob Zombie
Rob Zombie
Rob Zombie is an American musician, film director, screenwriter and film producer. He founded the heavy metal band White Zombie and has been nominated three times as a solo artist for the Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance.Zombie has also established a career as a film director, creating the...
directed cult classic House of 1000 Corpses
House of 1000 Corpses
House of 1000 Corpses is a 2003 exploitation horror film written and directed by Rob Zombie; it is his directorial debut. It was released in the United States on April 11, 2003 by Lions Gate Entertainment.-Plot:...
.
Pollard suggested the title "The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys" for the Traffic
Traffic (band)
Traffic were an English rock band whose members came from the West Midlands. The group formed in April 1967 by Steve Winwood, Jim Capaldi, Chris Wood and Dave Mason...
song of the same name.
External links
- Michael J. Pollard at Internet off-Broadway Database