Mike Henry  

Biography

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Michael Dennis "Mike" Henry (born August 15, 1936 in Los Angeles, California) is a former American football linebacker and actor. Henry's football career as a linebacker for the Pittsburgh Steelers (1958–1961) and the Los Angeles Rams (1962–1964) led him to be noticed by Warner Bros. His most prominent role was as Tarzan in three 1960s movies, Tarzan and the Valley of Gold (1966), Tarzan and the Great River (1967), and Tarzan and the Jungle Boy (1968), that were all filmed back-to-back in 1965. Henry turned down the lead of the subsequent Tarzan television series, which then went to actor Ron Ely. After leaving the Tarzan series Henry was one of many actors to be under consideration for the title role in the Batman TV series, which was originally to have been done as a straight crime-adventure series before producer William Dozier opted for a more satirical campy format. (The role of Batman ultimately went to Adam West). Henry is also known for playing Jackie Gleason's dim-witted son "Junior" in the Smokey and the Bandit films opposite Burt Reynolds and Sally Field. Henry also portrayed "Sergeant Kowalski" in The Green Berets, and "Lt. Col. Donald Penobscot" in three episodes of the television series M*A*S*H. His last acting roles were on the TV shows Gilmore Girls and Scrubs in the mid 2000's, after which he contracted Parkinson's Disease and retired from acting. Description above from the Wikipedia article Seth Mike Henry (American football), licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.