Douglas V. Fowley

Despite his slick, handsome appearance, Douglas Fowley was frequently cast as a bad guy or rabble-rouser for much of his acting career. His early credits consisted of B-flicks such as the 1937 comedy "Charlie Chan on Broadway," but the film gave him the main villain role--racketeer Johnny Burke. By the '50s, he was alternating between movies and television series, and one in particular, the musical "Singin' in the Rain," allowed him to branch out from playing a sleaze to a motion picture director. During this period, he appeared as a supporting player in all manner of films, the most memorable of which included the special effects-laden adventure "Mighty Joe Young" and the 1950 film noir "Armored Car Robbery," in which he played "Benny" McBride, who gets recruited by a gang of thieves only to find out the mastermind is also sleeping with his character's wife. An interesting departure from rogue characters came with the 1949 war drama "Battleground," in which he instead played a soldier. By the mid-'50s, his small-screen resume included the role of Doc Holliday in the series "The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp," all the while becoming an increasingly familiar face in western-themed programs. In the '60s, he grew a long beard and started going by Douglas V. Fowley. His notable roles included "Pistols 'n' Petticoats," a sitcom about a family of frontier women who do just fine without men around. Fowley passed away at age 86.