Normally the monthly CCCC-up is purely about the other main actors from Cold Case that aren’t Kathryn. This time I’m making an exception.
Earlier this month saw the passing of the actor James Best (picture above), most famous for playing Sheriff Rosco P Coltrane in the long-running TV series The Dukes Of Hazzard. The show ran for 7 seasons and over 140 episodes, not far of Cold Case‘s figures. James’ last film work was in The Sweeter Side Of Life starring as the father of Kathryn’s leading role of Desiree Harper.
James will forever be seen as Rosco but take even a brief look at his filmography and you’ll see he started working at the age of 24 in 1950. He is credited in more than 180 projects in a career that spanned 64 years. I’m far from knowledgeable about American TV from that era but even I know that shows like The Lone Ranger, Wagon Train, The Andy Griffith Show, The Twilight Zone, The Fugitive, Rawhide, Perry Mason, Bonanza, and Gun Smoke were some of the biggest. James appeared in all of those, many more and a lot of films too.
1979 and onwards James’ work was dominated by the creation he made his own: Rosco P Coltrane. The original Dukes TV series saw a cartoon version, a spin-off about Sheriff Coltrane’s deputy Enos, and several TV movies staring James and many of the original cast made. The family connection of the writing/directing/producing pairing of his daughter Janeen and her husband Michael Damien kept James on the small screen as he starred in several of their TV movie projects. The Sweeter Side Of Life was one of those.
James Best 1926-2015.
Heading back towards Cold Case we take a brief pitstop to mention the actor who played Lilly Rush’s half-brother Finn, Brett Davern. Several times over the life of this site I’ve posted (most notably here) about Kathryn’s foray in to motorsport when she took part in the Toyota Pro/Celebrity charity race (which is one of the support categories to the Longbeach GP IndyCar race) back in 2007. Brett recently competed for the third time at the event. After winning overall last year he was upgraded to Pro status for 2015, meaning that he no longer benefited from the 30-second head-start the celebs get. He finished 6th, some way behind Alfonso Ribeiro (Carlton on The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air), who is already is a two-time winner, and therefore also a celeb classed as a pro.
Getting back on track (see what I did there?) I get the pleasure of mentioning one of our less regular regulars Jeremy Ratchford (Nick Vera on CC). Just last week Jeremy made a guest-starring appearance in the latest episode of the still-going TV series Bones. Jeremy played a high-stakes poker player, one of several suspected of killing a fellow gambler to steal his winnings. ‘ATM’, nicknamed because he’s always paying out money, has a few arguments with Special Agent Seeley ‘Booth’ Booth (David Boreanaz, of Buffy and Angel fame). Did he do it?
Leave a Reply