Obituary: David Doyle
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Your support makes all the difference.As Bosley, assistant to the three female detectives' invisible boss in the hit American television series Charlie's Angels, the actor David Doyle gained world-wide fame in the Seventies, although he had already won regular roles in the series Bridget Loves Bernie and The New Dick Van Dyke Show. Each week, in Charlie's Angels, Doyle oversaw the trio of heroines on behalf of their unseen boss, Charlie, as each one was placed in jeopardy, managing to get through a wardrobe of half a dozen or more outfits each and keeping their trendy hairstyles and make-up in tact. Some critics dismissed the programme as sexist, but up to 50 million Americans tuned in regularly and it thrilled international audiences for five years.
Born in Nebraska in 1929, Doyle made his Broadway theatre debut in Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter, replacing Walter Matthau, and he also performed in a production of South Pacific at the Lincoln Center, New York. He appeared in more than 20 films, including Act One (1964), No Way to Treat a Lady (1968), Paper Lion (1968), Loving (1970), Vigilante Force (1976), Capricorn One (1978), The Comeback (1982) and Love or Money (1990), and provided the voice of the guardian cricket Pepe in The Adventures of Pinocchio, last year's live-action remake of the Disney animated classic.
But it was on television that the actor was best known. Doyle played Walt Fitzgerald in Bridget Loves Bernie (1972-73), a popular series starring Meredith Baxter and David Birney, and based on the long-running Twenties Broadway comedy Abie's Irish Rose. Then came the role of Ted Atwater in The New Dick Van Dyke Show (1972-73), in which the star tried to revive the success of the original Sixties sitcom, but it failed to reach the same level of popularity.
In 1976, Doyle was cast as John Bosley in the producer Aaron Spelling's international hit Charlie's Angels, which ran until 1981. The original trio of glamorous actresses starring as female detectives - Kate Jackson, Jaclyn Smith and Farrah Fawcett-Majors - changed as the series went on, but Doyle remained for its entire run. Charlie Townsend, the Angels' boss, was never seen, but his voice was supplied by John Forsythe, who was later to find even greater fame as Blake Carrington in Dynasty. Doyle also directed some episodes of the first series.
His other notable television roles included Kurt Mueller in Police Story (1973) and Teddy Roosevelt in Wild and Woolly (1978). He also appeared in many television films and in episodes of series such as The Patty Duke Show (as Jonathan Harrison, 1963-66), That Was the Week That Was, M*A*S*H (1973), All in the Family (1974), Taxi (1975), Fantasy Island, Starman (1986), Rugrats (1991), Road Rovers (1996) and, shortly before his death, The New Adventures of Superman and the new soap Sunset Beach, featuring Lesley-Anne Down.
David Fitzgerald Doyle, actor: born Lincoln, Nebraska 1 December 1929; married; died Los Angeles 26 February 1997.
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