Today is the 109th birthday of Jim Backus, everyone’s favorite millionaire shipwreck survivor. Was I the only one that had the take away thought from Gilligan’s Island that money can’t buy everything? Here he was, stranded on an island with his wife (they apparently brought trunk-loads of cash, jewelry, and clothing for a short afternoon boat ride) and they could not buy their way out of their situation. I guess I sort of liked that thought. That, and as Mr. Magoo, it was nice to know that blind people could still drive cars. The world is a better place because he was in it and still feels the loss that he has left.
NAME: Jim Backus
OCCUPATION: Film Actor, Television Actor, Radio Personality, Writer
BIRTH DATE: February 25, 1913
DEATH DATE: July 03, 1989
EDUCATION: Kentucky Military Institute, American Academy of Dramatic Arts
PLACE OF BIRTH: Cleveland, Ohio
PLACE OF DEATH: Los Angeles, California
Full Name: James Gilmore Backus
HOLLYWOOD WALK OF FAME 1735 Vine Street (television)
REMAINS: Buried, Westwood Memorial Park, Los Angeles, CA
BEST KNOWN FOR: Jim Backus was a film and TV actor known for his roles in Rebel Without a Cause and Gilligan’s Island, as well as being the voice of Mr. Magoo.
Actor and author James Gilmore Backus was born on February 25, 1913, in Cleveland, Ohio. For five decades, Jim Backus entertained audiences in a variety of media, starting out in radio and moving on to film and television. Two of his trademark roles were the wealthy and snooty Thurston Howell III on Gilligan’s Island and Mr. Magoo, an optically challenged and bumbling cartoon character. The son of an engineer, he was more interested in golf and acting than in school. Backus worked for a stock theater company during his teens. In one of the company’s productions, he had a small role while future film star Clark Gable had the lead.
Wanting his son to focus on academics, Backus’s father sent him to the Kentucky Military Institute for a time where he met and befriended Victor Mature, another future professional actor. But Backus struggled his way through high school and was able to convince his father to let him skip a traditional college education. Instead he went to New York City to study at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts.
Graduating in 1933, Backus spent two years working in a variety of stage productions and in summer stock before trying his hand at radio. Adept at molding his booming voice into different characters, he was a freelance performer and appeared on numerous radio programs, including soap operas and The Kate Smith Hour. Backus also made his Broadway debut around this time in Hitch Your Wagon, a comedy, in 1937. Later that year, he appeared in the drama Too Many Heroes.
In the 1940s, Backus scored his biggest radio success on The Alan Young Show. He created a stuffy, upper crust character named Hubert Updyke III, who was known for making such quips as “Careful, or I’ll have your mouth washed out with domestic champagne.” By the end of the decade, Backus was beginning his film career. One of his earliest roles was in the football drama Easy Living (1949) with Lucille Ball and old friend Victor Mature.
Also in 1949, Backus was selected to voice one of the characters for a cartoon entitled Ragtime Bear. Little did he know that the character, Quincy Magoo, a nearsighted fellow with a very selective take on reality, would become so hugely popular. Backus spent about three decades as Magoo in his various incarnations from cartoon shorts to television series to a full-length film.
On the small screen, Backus spent three years on the sitcom I Married Joan, which debuted in the fall of 1952. He played Judge Bradley Stevens, husband to Joan Stevens (Joan Davis). Each episode featured a case in front of Bradley, a domestic judge, and its parallels to his domestic life. After the series ended, Backus gave some of his best film performances. He earned praise for his work on the comedy Francis in the Navy (1955) and the teenage drama Rebel Without a Cause (1955) with James Dean. In Rebel Without a Cause, Backus played Dean’s father, a man befuddled by his son’s actions and oppressed by his domineering wife.
Based in part on his earlier character, Hubert Updyke III, Backus again inhabited the persona of a privileged, uptight rich man on Gilligan’s Island. Thurston Howell III was one of seven castaways marooned on an island together after a terrible storm sent their boat crashing onto its shores. In addition to his wife, Mrs. Howell, who his character always called “lovey,” there were the ship’s captain Skipper (Alan Hale Jr.) and his first mate Gilligan (Bob Denver), the professor (Russell Johnson), the movie star Ginger (Tina Louise) and a simple farm girl named Mary Ann (Mary Ann Summers). Created by Sherwood Schwartz, the broad comedy was dismissed by reviewers but adored by many viewers. “The critics assassinated it, but the kids flipped for it,” Backus later said, according to an article in The New York Times. “I’ve been watching the reruns, and confess I’m hooked on it myself.”
While the show was only on network television from 1964 to 1967, Gilligan’s Island has had a healthy life in syndication and can still be seen today. Backus voiced an animated version of Thurston Howell III for the Saturday morning cartoon series, The New Adventures of Gilligan in the mid-1970s. Reprising his famous role, he appeared for the 1978 television movie Rescue from Gilligan’s Island. That same year, Backus received a heartbreaking diagnosis. He was having some trouble with his legs and learned that he had Parkinson’s disease.
Despite this setback, Backus continued acting. He made his final film appearance in 1980’s There Goes the Bride with Tom Smothers and Phil Silvers. On the small screen, he appeared in The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan’s Island (1981) and made guest appearances on such shows as Fantasy Island and The Love Boat.
In addition to acting, Backus had authored Rocks on the Roof (1958) on his own and several other works with his wife Henny. Married since 1943, the couple used their life experiences for such personal works as What Are You Doing After the Orgy (1962), which was about their marriage, and Backus Strikes Back (1984), which tackled his struggle with Parkinson’s.
In late June of 1988, Backus was admitted to St. John’s Hospital and Health Center in Santa Monica, California. He died of pneumonia on July 3, 1988. Over the course of his long career, Backus had appeared in roughly 80 films and 500 film and television episodes as Quincy Magoo. And each day, he wins new fans as they watch Gilligan’s Island in syndication.
TELEVISION
Blondie Mr. Dithers (1968-69)
Gilligan’s Island Thurston Howell III (1964-67)
Mr. Magoo Mr. Magoo (voice, 1964-65)
I Married Joan Judge Bradley Stevens (1952-55)
FILMOGRAPHY AS ACTOR
Prince Jack (Dec-1985)
Slapstick (of Another Kind) (1982)
The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan’s Island (15-May-1981)
There Goes the Bride (Jul-1980)
C.H.O.M.P.S. (21-Dec-1979) · Mr. Gibbs
The Rebels (14-May-1979)
The Castaways on Gilligan’s Island (3-May-1979)
Good Guys Wear Black (21-Mar-1979)
Angels’ Brigade (1979)
Rescue from Gilligan’s Island (14-Oct-1978)
Pete’s Dragon (3-Nov-1977)
The Amazing Cosmic Awareness of Duffy Moon (4-Feb-1976)
Friday Foster (25-Dec-1975) · Enos Griffith
Crazy Mama (Jun-1975) · Mr. Albertson
The Girl Most Likely to… (6-Nov-1973)
Now You See Him, Now You Don’t (23-Aug-1972)
Myra Breckinridge (24-Jun-1970)
Cockeyed Cowboys of Calico County (1-May-1970) · Staunch
Hello Down There (25-Jun-1969)
Where Were You When the Lights Went Out? (19-Jun-1968)
Hurry Sundown (6-Feb-1967)
Billie (15-Sep-1965)
Fluffy (27-Jun-1965)
John Goldfarb, Please Come Home (24-Mar-1965)
Advance to the Rear (15-Apr-1964)
The Wheeler Dealers (14-Nov-1963) · Bullard Bear
Sunday in New York (13-Nov-1963) · Flight Dispatcher
It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (7-Nov-1963) · Tyler Fitzgerald
Johnny Cool (2-Oct-1963) · Louis Murphy
Critic’s Choice (13-Apr-1963) · Dr. William von Hagedorn
My Six Loves (3-Apr-1963)
Operation Bikini (26-Mar-1963)
Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol (18-Dec-1962) · Mister Magoo [VOICE]
The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (7-Aug-1962) · The King
Zotz! (Jul-1962) · Horatio Kellgore
Boys’ Night Out (21-Jun-1962) · Peter Bowers
The Horizontal Lieutenant (18-Apr-1962)
Ice Palace (2-Jan-1960)
1001 Arabian Nights (1-Dec-1959) [VOICE]
A Private’s Affair (14-Aug-1959)
The Big Operator (Aug-1959)
The Wild and the Innocent (27-May-1959)
Ask Any Girl (21-May-1959) · Maxwell
Macabre (Oct-1958) · Jim Tyloe
The High Cost of Loving (16-May-1958)
The Pied Piper of Hamelin (26-Nov-1957)
Eighteen and Anxious (15-Nov-1957)
Man of a Thousand Faces (13-Aug-1957) · Clarence Locan
Top Secret Affair (30-Jan-1957) · Col. Gooch
The Great Man (Dec-1956)
You Can’t Run Away from It (31-Oct-1956)
The Girl He Left Behind (26-Oct-1956) · Sgt. Hanna
The Opposite Sex (26-Oct-1956) · Psychiatrist
The Naked Hills (17-Jun-1956)
Meet Me in Las Vegas (9-Mar-1956) · Tom Culdane
The Square Jungle (30-Dec-1955)
Rebel Without a Cause (27-Oct-1955) · Frank Stark
Francis in the Navy (5-Aug-1955)
Deep in My Heart (9-Dec-1954) · Ben Judson
I Love Melvin (20-Mar-1953) · Mergo
Angel Face (11-Dec-1952) · Judson
Androcles and the Lion (Dec-1952)
Above and Beyond (21-Nov-1952) · Gen. Curtis E. LeMay
Don’t Bother to Knock (18-Jul-1952) · Peter Jones
Pat and Mike (13-Jun-1952) · Charles Barry
Deadline USA (14-Mar-1952) · Jim Cleary
Here Come the Nelsons (23-Feb-1952) · Joe Randolph
I Want You (23-Dec-1951)
I’ll See You in My Dreams (6-Dec-1951) · Sam Harris
The Man with a Cloak (27-Nov-1951) · Flaherty
His Kind of Woman (29-Aug-1951) · Myron Winton
Iron Man (18-Aug-1951) · Max Watkins
Bright Victory (16-Jul-1951) · Bill Grayson
Half Angel (5-May-1951)
M (Mar-1951)
Emergency Wedding (15-Nov-1950)
Customs Agent (18-May-1950)
Ma and Pa Kettle Go to Town (1-Apr-1950)
A Dangerous Profession (10-Dec-1949) · Nick Ferrone
The Great Lover (23-Nov-1949)
Easy Living (8-Oct-1949) · Dr. Franklin
Father Was a Fullback (30-Sep-1949)
One Last Fling (30-Jun-1949)
Waldina 