Oh you blundering blunderer!

by chuckofish

Lot’s of famous actors were born on this day: Greer Garson, Gene Autry, Trevor Howard, Stanley Kramer, Brenda Marshall, Madeline Kahn…the list goes on and we could toast any of them. But I’m going to focus instead on someone who died on this day: the actor Edward Everett Horton, born in Brooklyn, New York in 1886.

Over his long acting career, Horton frequently played an eccentric friend or a butler…

…and you might remember his distinctive voice as the narrator of “Fractured Fairy Tales” on The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show (1959-61).

But who can forget him as the medicine man, Roaring Chicken on F Troop (1965-67), a show my DP and I loved as children?

With Frank de Kova (left) as Chief Wild Eagle

Indeed, Horton was one of those wonderful character actors who always stood out and added so much to every movie/TV show he was in.

Here’s a classic scene with the also great Eric Blore from Shall We Dance (1937).

Well, I am happy to remember Edward Everett Horton today and to toast him…with a pipkin of porter… a beaker of beer?

Enjoy your Tuesday!

(The painting is by Winslow Homer, whose birthday is today.)