MARTIN BALSAM Biography - Actors and Actresses

 
 

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MARTIN BALSAM

Name: Martin Henry Balsam                                                           
Born: 4 November 1919 The Bronx, New York City, USA                                 
Died: 13 February 1996 Rome, Italy                                                   
                                                                                     
Martin Henry Balsam (November 4, 1919 – February 13, 1996) was an American actor. 
                                                                                     
In 1947, he was selected by Elia Kazan and Lee Strasberg to be a player in the       
Actors Studio television program and went on to appear in a number of television     
plays in the 1950s and returned frequently to television as a guest star on         
numerous dramas (e.g. The Twilight Zone). Balsam appeared in such films as On       
the Waterfront, 12 Angry Men (as Juror #1), Time Limit, Psycho, Cape Fear (1962)     
as the police chief, Breakfast at Tiffany's, Seven Days in May, Catch-22, Tora!     
Tora! Tora!, The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, Two-Minute Warning, The Delta       
Force, Death Wish 3, The Goodbye People, and the 1991 Martin Scorsese remake of     
Cape Fear (Balsam, Gregory Peck, and Robert Mitchum all appeared in both the         
1962 and 1991 versions of the film).                                                 
                                                                                     
Balsam played Washington Post editor Howard Simons in the 1976 blockbuster All       
the President's Men. He also appeared in a film that eventually became a             
highly popular Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode, the 1975 Joe Don Baker         
police drama Mitchell. In 1973, he played Dr. Rudy Wells when the Martin Caidin     
novel, Cyborg was adapted as the TV-movie, The Six Million Dollar Man, though he     
did not reprise the role for the subsequent weekly series. In 1965, he won an       
Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Arnold Burns in A           
Thousand Clowns. He appeared as a spokesman/hostage in the 1976 TV movie Raid on     
Entebbe and as a detective in the 1977 TV movie Contract on Cherry Street.           
                                                                                     
Balsam starred as Murray Klein on the All in the Family spin-off Archie Bunker's     
Place for two seasons (1979-1981). In 1967, he won a Tony Award for his             
appearance in the 1967 Broadway production of You Know I Can't Hear You When the     
Water's Running.