foofur
Allan Melvin dead at 84
Allan Melvin had so many roles on so many TV shows over the years that it's hard to know where to begin, but I guess the most logical spot would be The Brady Bunch, where he played Sam The Butcher, the guy Alice dated. He was also a regular on The Phil Silvers Show, played Archie Bunker's friend Barney on All in the Family, and also played Rob's army buddy on The Dick Van Dyke Show. He appeared on dozens of other shows over the years, from the Andy Griffith Show (he always played a crook - that's him on the right in the pic) and Gomer Pyle, USMC to Kung Fu and The Banana Splits (he was Drooper).
You would probably also recognize his voice in many cartoons, including Magilla Gorilla, The Flintstones, The Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Hour, The Smurfs, Spider-Man and Friends, Foofur, Ducktales, Talespin, and others.
He died of cancer in Los Angeles.
Short-Lived Shows: Foofur
The creation of Foofur, a Saturday morning cartoon that ran on NBC for two seasons starting in 1986, is typically credited to Freddy Monnickendam, the man who helped bring The Smurfs to American television and who later created The Snorks. However, Don Markstein of Toonopedia writes that the cartoon is more precisely attributed to Phil Mendez, who created Kissyfur one year earlier. Whoever created it, Foofur was a staple of my Saturday mornings, and I was glad to find a few episodes on YouTube.
TV Squad Hot Topics
Most Popular Articles
From Our Partners
- Matt's Inside Line: Scoop on NCIS: LA, Person of Interest, House, Big Bang, White Collar and More
- Vampire Diaries Boss Talks Offing Originals, Teases 'Major Jeopardy' for All by Season's End
- Project Runway All-Stars Recap: Seasonal Subjective Disorder
- Good Wife Exclusive: Michael J. Fox, Jill Flint, Elizabeth Reaser Returning this Spring
- The TVLine-Up: TV Worth Watching This Friday
- More From TVLine
- Watch Gloria Estefan's Campy New Video, ‘Hotel Nacional'
- Movie Review: The Imagination-Lacking Journey 2: Mysterious Island
- DreamWorks Is Remaking Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca
- Air's Nicolas Godin on A Trip to the Moon, Working With the Dead, and Space Travel
- Today Is the One-Year Anniversary of Rebecca Black's ‘Friday'
- More from Vulture
