Actor George Segal is Dead to Me!!!

Oh, no! Please tell me he wasn't picking up groceries in Boulder!

So young.

RIP!!!

Awww I loved him in movies

so hot in "A Touch of Class."

He was INCREDIBLY sexy in "Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?".

He was so hot in the (homoerotic) WW2 movie King Rat

He looked mainstream like another Mel Gibson.

And then suddenly when he hit his forties he turned into an alte mentsh.

Star of Rollercoaster – in SENSURROUND!

I liked him and he was rather lovely to look at during his early career Sad news.RIP.

Was his name pronounced 'Seagle' or 'See-garl'?

Please don't take Barbra!

I thought he was already dead.

Then I looked at his Wikipedia page, JUST the other day, after watching his 1977 movie with Jane Fonda, "Fun With Dick and Jane", and found out he wasn't.

And now this...

He was in the original version of Fun with Dick and Jane - with Jane Fonda.

He was still alive?

Time for another drink!

A Touch of Class is so underrated.

People bitch about Glenda's oscar win, but she was great in the movie. She would have made a fantastic screwball comedienne a la Eve Arden and Rosalind Russell.

Even though they portray different characters. Lost and Found was the unofficial sequel in that it reunited a lot of the original cast.

Fred must be devastated.

I didn't realize he was that old.

Loved George Segal. Noticed he didn’t look too well this season of The Goldbergs.

This makes me sad. I loved when he appeared on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and played the ukulele or the banjo.

Those of you who thought he was already dead -- he's been a regular on a long-running sitcom for the past eight years.

I liked him and his acting. He also played a young Denzel Washington 's father in Carbon Copy. That Hoot and Pussy film is streaming free via several apps, channels.

Well, he ended on a high note. He was one of the biggest actors in the 60s and 70s and then he fizzled for decades.

He had a great run with the Goldbergs. Good way to bow out.

George Segal, 87

I loved George and Barbra in "The Owl and the Pussycat."

Handsome as a young man.

RIP

The Owl and the Pussycat

Very good actor. Also on Just Shoot Me so he was on two long-running series.

He played Eric Robert's father in 1996's "It's My Party".

George Segal was also great in the television sitcom "Just Shoot Me," 1997-2003, with Wendy Malick, David Spade and Laura San Giacomo.

The Just Shoot Me cast reunion from March 2020

Very underrated actor. RIP

You Lisa VanderPump plays Glenda Jackson’s daughter in a Touch of Class.

I never saw The Goldbergs, but I heard it was quite funny.

I'm so worried I'm be next. Shirley has assured me another life awaits me but I don't believe her and don't want to offend her, though given the number of people I've offended over the years one more really wouldn't matter.

Hold me James. I'm scared.

He's got a hilarious interview with Jiminy Glick. Starts at 36:33 for those interested.

He had a good run in 60s/70s movies--even in dramas and thrillers, he usually found a comic aspect (often exasperation) in his characters that humanized them. And he had good timing in his straight comedies. RIP

I watched Just Shoot Me when I was a kid. I still quote one of his random lines:

Never trust a man with two first names.

Bypass surgery at 87?

[r22] Since so many DL'ers thought he was already dead, I think this is a strong indication that the target demographic of the late Mr. Segal's sitcom on which he was working is not the readership of DL. Either that, or it was on after 8pm; i.e., bedtime.

He was great in “Where’s Poppa” with Ruth Gordon.

I always confused him with Richard Crenna.

RIP.

Coming soon...

He was very entertaining in the caper movie The Hot Rock with Robert Redford.

R17 hear hear. Glenda damn well deserved that Oscar. George had perfect chemistry with her and I’m sure she credits him a lot enabling her to win. Brilliant actor. I can’t say he’s underrated because he’s worked non stop for 60 years. Virginia Woolf was obviously his best work. But many great films. Last Married Couple is a guilty favorite of mine. The film plays as a long dirty joke. But again, perfect chemistry with Natalie Wood. He was friends with Natalie and RJ.

Wonder how they will handle his death on "The Goldbergs". George was an important character.

He said he learned to play banjo at 13 and never stopped.

So is Robert Wagner the last big name from The Longest Day who's still alive?

R45. I’m still alive and ready to step in!

Loved him in "High Tide" (that Rick Springfield Baywatch-ripoff from the 90s).

During a scene from "The Owl and the Pussycat," Barbra (Doris) asked George (Felix) what he was writing. He was reluctant to tell her but finally relented and read a passage about the sunrise coming up over the horizon and "spitting" light. Barbra as the loud-mouth, pushy hooker did not get the imagery and metaphor.

When he finally asked her to leave the apartment, she got all incensed, told him he was a lousy writer "because the goddamn sun doesn't spit."

That line continues to make me laugh all these years later.

Liz Taylor his co star from Virginia Woolf died exactly 10 years ago today. Kind of weird George would pick today to exit.

George was outstanding in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" opposite the sublime Sandy Dennis...and of course, Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.

R47. I went to IMDB and there are 3 others still alive.

All gone.

Poor Melinda, r52....

"A Touch of Class is so underrated."

I *love* how youngsters discover something and think they're the only one. Then say things like, Lucille Ball so UNDERRATED!

A Touch of Class was rated just fine. If anything it was OVER rated.

He was replaced by Dudley Moore in the movie "10", which launched Dudley's stardom. I never could see Segal doing justice to the role. After that, Segal's movie career went south and he never was a major film star again. TV rescued him with Just Shoot Me and The Goldbergs.

Damn. "Mr. Sherman... Mr. Sherman... I am just a little girl all alone in the hallway."

(Thinking of you, Other Mr. Sherman, and wondering if you are still on DL).

r56, you think it's "youngsters" posting about A Touch of Class?

Maybe if you're 88, everyone seems young...

R57, In her autobiography, Julie Andrews wrote that George dropped out of "10" at the last minute and she never discovered the reason why.

He and James Fox had tons of chemistry in King Rat

Wow, another great takes his final bow.

I loved George Segal in "A Touch of Class," and that movie remains one of my guilty pleasures, too, as expressed by a fellow-DLer upthread.

"Whose Afraid..." was on TCM last week, and I'm so glad I had the foresight to DVR it, having not seen the film in years.

🎼"If we had walked instead of raced, And just made love instead of hate..."

Rest In Peace, Mr. Segal.🪕

"No Way to Treat a Lady" with Rod Steiger, Lee Remick and Eileen Heckart is an underrated film.

R47, Excuse me?

If anything, he would have improved 10. It would have been more believable.

He did some theater (as well as TV) after his movie career stalled, and in 2001, at 67, made his West End debut as Serge in Yazmina Reza's "Art".

The lead character in "10" was an obnoxious sleazy pornographer. Segal was still handsome and masculine and would have been perceived as a sex monster.

Dudley was vulnerable and made the character less offensive to women viewers.

(BTW I hate this movie and I hate Blake Edwards)

R61 Are you implying there was some homo tension between the two characters in the film?

68 responses and not one nod to the delightful Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox ??? For shame ! I loved him as a baby gay,found him very sexy.

Sad that he ended his career on that crap sitcom "The Goldbergs."

^ Jiminy Glick's interviews are like Edna Everage's.

He and Buck Henry worked as an improv team at the Premise in the early 60s, then made a comedy album ("At Home with the Other Family") which also featured Joan Rivers. Mike Nichols cast him in his off-Broadway production of "The Knack" in 1964 before casting him as Nick in the movie of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?"

My favorite:

I thought he was excellent as Biff Loman in a 1966 television production of "Death of a Salesman," in which Lee J. Cobb and Mildred Dunnock reprised their original Broadway roles as Willy and Linda Loman. James Farentino played Happy.

He was a great comedien, and I found him sexy in King Rat. I was just a kid, but I thought that character was madly hot.

Awww, this makes me sad. I watched a good number of his films for the first time around the New Year for some reason (Loving, A Touch of Class, Where's Poppa, California Split). What a great talent and, honestly, a bit underrated.

Great actor. RIP.

Was "Loving" any good?

Rest in peace. Since this is DL here's some truth: George Segal was gay, closeted/with a beard in a marriage of convenience, and would go to rounds in NYC in the early 1980s to pick up discreet hustlers.

The Shitlick's?

Rest in peace. Since this is DL here's some truth for you: George was gay, in a marriage of convenience with a beard, and he would go to rounds in the early 1980s to pick up discreet hustlers.

The ShitKings, r80, the ShitKings.

He wore a size 7 shoe.

No big loss.

[quote]and would go to rounds in NYC in the early 1980s to pick up discreet hustlers.

How can you tell if a hustler's discreet?

Just the early 80s?

Any word of condolence from Susan Dey yet?

What was on his iPod?

Discreet hustlers used hand fans.

Ship of Fools

Of Mice and Men (tv)

The Desperate Hours (tv)

I’ve seen him in so many movies and shows and he’s been in plenty of other tv series but short lived ones.

[quote] He was one of the biggest actors in the 60s and 70s and then he fizzled for decades.

He was nuts and nobody would hire him. A lot of people in the 60s and 70s took tons of drugs & indulged their neuroses. He was one of them. He became too kooky. He eventually settled down to be just plain eccentric and was able to get work again,

I just read the NYT obituary for George Segal.

Whomever wrote it is lazy and stupid. They said that Fun With Dick And Jane was released in 1979. It was released in 1977. Then the same writer says it was a movie about the 1%.

WHAT?

I last saw the movie in November. Jane Fonda and George Segal were Upper Middle Class NOT the 1%.

R81- He was handsome in the 1960's and the 1970's. I would assume he had NO problem getting quality cock in those days.

[quote] the 1%.

Sheesh! The NYT must be employing millennials.

[quote]Whomever wrote it is lazy and stupid.

Pot meets kettle?

TOATP

R94- Babs was so FUCKIN tacky in that movie.

R83- My show size is 17.

I'm not crazy, R58, I've just been in a very bad mood for 40 years!

R95. Barbra played a hooker in The Owl and The Pussycat. She was supposed to be kind of tacky and down on her luck. They both were. But they were also both funny--and that was the point. They were funny, not tacky.

Of course this thread has been hijacked by all the Barbra trolls. But that's okay. It's why I come to DL.

R57 I never knew that. Fitting, then, that Streisand replaced Dudley Moore with George Segal in The Mirror Has Two Faces, (100 replies and no one has mentioned this yet??)

Well, R100, Dudley was a Gentile.

His career fizzled for a spell because of his MASSIVE coke habit.

[quote](BTW I hate this movie and I hate Blake Edwards)

I hate his wife. The only thing interesting about her died in the 1990s.

According to IMDB, Moore also replaced Segal in "Arthur"; then, Segal replaced Moore in "Prince of Tides".

The first time he sniffed cocaine, he thought, oh my God, this is it, I have now experienced euphoria, I'm smarter than anybody, I'm king of the world. It was good. That one time. After that, he went on doing it until his teeth were grinding together, but he never had the high again.

"Look," he says, sweetly reasonably, "if there wasn't an up side, people wouldn't do it. There's no point in denying it. No point in saying, 'Just Say No', like people are a bunch of sheep who do it because their friends snort. Say No doesn't hack it. You take it, you get to be king of the world, and then you find that coke is an entirely loveless and destructive drug and you chase it for a while and then you stop."

Then he started having panic attacks, or, in the vernacular, episodes of acute anxiety, where he'd find himself lying on the floor in the foetal position, shaking and whimpering.

Who knew George Segal and Dudley Moore were so interchangable?

I can't imagine big, masculine Barbra kissing small, cuddly Dudley.

Oops, I meant "The Mirror has Two Faces", not "The Prince of Tides".

I’ve only seen Segal in “Look Who’s Talking” and “Just Shoot Me”, and I found him entertaining in both projects. Rest In Peace.

[quote]He was one of the biggest actors in the 60s and 70s and then he fizzled for decades.

Speaking of Babs, her ex-husband had a similar career trajectory.

R98, Babs showed her tits, PLAYBOY published the screen shots.

RIP George Segal. A good actor who kept working until the end. He did good work.

I did not know that George Segal was a CONNOISSEUR of cock.

R78 I didn't think Loving was good, but I wouldn't call it terrible, either. It's very much of it's time. A typical early 70s film about an unhappily middle-aged married couple. It had its moments, though.

R110 Someone should make a movie with the two of them...

HUGE cocaine problem for a long time. RIP

I had brunch with him and his daughter,Polly, at graduation from Brown years ago. Was friends w Polly there. He was funny and quick and unassuming. My mom had a huge crush on him forever so she was on cloud nine.

Loved him in Blume in Love.

A couple of George Segal-related anecdotes from some autobiographies I’ve read:

Elizabeth Ashley wrote in “Actress” that during the filming of “Ship of Fools”, there was a scene where Segal and Ashley’s characters have a fight and he slapped her, followed by a post-fight scene. The follow-up scene was shot first, and Ashley played it under the assumption that Segal’s character just belted her. When it came time to shoot the actual fight scene, Segal told director Stanley Kramer that he wasn’t going to hit Ashley. Kramer didn’t press the issue, and since Segal was under contract to Columbia (the studio that released “Ship of Fools”) no one else did, either — not good for a leading man to be slapping his leading lady. Meanwhile, Ashley had already played the follow-up scene predicated on the fact that he’d hit her, and felt her performance was over-the-top — and she didn’t want to make waves on a set with a lot of heavy-hitters. She expressed ambivalence about her work in the film.

In Paul Mazursky’s “Show Me the Magic”, he wrote that Segal made costar Susan Anspach cry when he wrongfully accused her of stealing his French eye drops.

French eye drops?

Yes, R120, Segal had some expensive eye drops from France (had ‘Bleu’ in brand name, if memory serves) hat supposedly made his eyes sparkle (who knew?) and when they disappeared, Segal held up filming and blamed Anspach.

I read that George pulled out of 10 when he discovered Blake had rewritten the script to feature more of his wife.

r120 r121 Non c'erano colliri a Venezia?

"But decades earlier, when he was a rising young actor, a handful of dramatic roles placed him on the verge of A-list stardom."

NYTimes

He was A List ...not on the verge....what say you Eldergays?

Very much A-list for a time

RIP, George Segal. I follow David Spade on IG and he spelled his former 'Just Shoot Me' co-star's name as "George Siegel." Eek!

r126 David Spayed.

R126 here again...I just checked again and David Spade corrected his post after Rob Schneider--of all people--corrected him on the spelling. I wish Wendi Malick was active on social media, to see what she has to say. Jane Fonda's too busy talking about climate control to make a tribute.

Barbra commented on the Twitter. So sorry to hear of his passing. We had so much fun making Owl and the Pussycat.

Segal was the kind of a guy a woman would choose over Robert Redford because he was engaging and fun while Redford, the much more handsome, was a boring stiff. Someone once told me this - she said Segal would be better in bed. I was fifteen and didn't get it.

He lived in my town and I occasionally saw him at the grocery store. His stepson owns a couple of restaurants and George did the local radio ad spots for one of them. I've only seen 'The Goldbergs' here and there, looks like they shot the show around him, as he'd be the only person in a scene, and then you'd see the back of his (stand-in's ) head in a group scene. In deference to his age, he probably flew to LA for a few days and did his scenes all at once.

I loved his straight-man roles, where the action and comedy happened around him, with him making lost-looking faces. RIP.

He and Redford were in "The Hot Rock" together. Saw it long time ago and can't remember a thing about it, but they both looked good.

See R130, R132. The Hot Rock was one of the worse films of the 1970s. Do yourself a favor and don't see it again.

Thanks for the warning--I missed the photo you posted at 130.

Press THAT in your book of memories!

One of my favorites: CALIFORNIA SPLIT co-starring Elliot Gould, directed by Robert Altman. (Currently available on Amazon Prime.)

Love their improv in this scene, which started with George's idea to name the Seven Dwarfs.

R84 they were discreet as they were paid to not talk about who their famous clients were, and what they did sexually.

George Segal was A-B list in the 1960s and 1970s, and in the 1980s he was known for playing the banjo on Carson.

Very sad to hear this. Always liked him. My guess is that 'The Goldbergs' will somehow address his death during next season's premiere since they already filmed everything for this season.

I would have gladly let him pick me up in the 60s and 70s

I saw him in the 1974 movie "The Terminal Man" as a young girl and remember finding him disturbing yet sexy, even though I didn't really understand the feeling then. I also thought he had some hardcore UST with James Fox in King Rat.

R140, who wouldn't, male or female? James Fox was hot af.

[quote] I also thought he had some hardcore UST with James Fox in King Rat.

Are you saying the word 'lust'?

UST stands for "unresolved sexual tension" or "unspoken sexual tension". This term was thrown around a lot back in the days of the show Smallville, because Lex Luthor always looked like he wanted to devour Clark Kent.

"George Segal was A-B list in the 1960s and 1970"

Um, no. Segal worked in the 1960s, he was not on any list or known by the general public at all. In the 1970s, he was definitely A-List. He could convincingly play roles that Clint Eastwood, Robert Redford, Steve McQueen, Jack Nicholson or Burt Reynolds could not.

R144 I wouldn’t consider him A list at any point (not the poster who said he was) but he had roles in very successful high profile films 60s and 70s including his Oscar nomination for WAOVW. Just being in that, after 1966 and with King Rat, and No Way to Treat a Lady, the public knew who he was.

[quote]Um, no. Segal worked in the 1960s, he was not on any list or known by the general public at all.

A ludicrous thing to say about one of the stars of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?"

George Segal was an after thought in Virginia Woolf. It didn't make him a star or a near star.

Btw, I was a movie goer in 1967. George Segal was not a star, nor an A or B lister after Woolf. Your post particularly, R146, tells me you were born after 1990. Nice try.

People didn't know him when he was nominated for an Oscar?!

Why would they? The name of an unknown in a category, not pictured, in the TV Guide in 1967.

R148 Damn Queen,did he turn down your offer a of blowjob ? You seem very invested in denigrating him. He was a good looking,funny guy and had a career most actors could only dream of. A life well lived. Move on, Hunty!

He was in the MATH department!!!

He's nobody's houseboy.....NOW!

[quote] "Whose Afraid..." was on TCM last week,

It was? Jeez, I hope they spelled it correctly.

R151, ha ha! Though not a good point about an actor who was unknown in the 60s.

He was not unknown in the 60s

^ OH YEAH? Describe.

He and Goldie Hawn made a great team in The Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox. The scene where they converse in foreign-language gibberish was hilarious.

"Alles gelt por una lousy dressisasario?"

"Oui, una lousy dressisasario was una grosso bargain!"

"Bullshit-arino!"

I saw Carbon Copy in the theater back in the day. It was hilarious and one could see the talent in Denzel's performance. I bet it could still find an audience today.

R159 that was one of those movies that was on cable seemingly everyday between the early 80s and early 90s.

As a mini-tribute to George, I watched 'Loving' yesterday for the first time. Not sure how obscure of a film this was, but definitely not the feel-good sort. His character is basically a selfish, drunken adulterous lout. I admit to having an affinity for artistic people in 60s/70s New York, and the grittiness of the period. He was so John Updike-y it wasn't funny.

I find him funny and utterly believable in "The Owl and the Pussycat". Babs has her funny moments but she spends so much time screaming and yelling at him that she made me wish the movie had been about a mute hooker who communicates with her johns entirely through obscene hand gestures. Sorry, not hooker. "Actress and model" .

Carbon Copy is one of the most inane stupid comedies ever made.

[quote]Carbon Copy is one of the most inane stupid comedies ever made.

So every film must aspire to be The Godfather?

^ The Godfather is not a comedy

I saw 'Fun With Dick & Jane' last night. Breezy fun and George and Jane both look great. Have always loved shows/movies with white suburbanites having cash-flow problems and finding unsavory ways to solve the issue.

[quote] white suburbanites

Do you love shows/movies with black suburbanites having cash-flow problems?

Doesn't FWDAJ have a scene with Fonda on the toilet?

^ Yuck

R167, it's the white folks who get themselves in a jam time and time again.

I don't know what your definition of a near star is, r147, but after Virginia Woolf, he worked steadily and indeed was a known commodity.

There was something about him that was comfortable and sexy at the same time. I can’t find the exact words to describe the quality. Peter Falk and James Garner had it, as well.

They had amiability, r172.

Thank you, r173! They did indeed.

Even as he aged and was playing grandpas, he retained a youthful quality.

Wrong, r147, in the 70s, Segal was at the least the Ben Stiller of his day.

[quote]^The Godfather is not a comedy.

🙄 fine...

So every COMEDY must aspire to be Boudu Saved From Drowning?

Everybody is a flop to you! Your husband’s a flop, *I’m* a flop...

R12- He looks good in that photo.

[quote] Segal was at the least the Ben Stiller of his day.

What Stiller? His parents were a housewife and a malt and hop agent.