Dick Wesson

Character actor Dick Wesson burst onto the scene in the early 1950s as someone who could be reliably called upon to provide acerbic comic relief. His run began with Irving Pichel's attempt at accurately portraying a voyage to the moon in "Destination Moon" and progressed to Westerns such as the Doris Day musical comedy "Calamity Jane" and "The Man Behind the Gun," about an undercover government agent battling relentless insurrectionists. But this turned out to be just the beginning of the Boston native's versatile career. By the late 1950s, he was honing his sideline writer skills on variety programs such as "The Bob Cummings Show," centered around the many romantic dalliances of photographer Bob Collins, leading to work in the 1960's as a producer on the Shady Rest Hotel family comedy "Petticoat Junction" and the teenage country girl comedy"Tammy." Wesson also continued to contribute episodic scripts to various other programs, most notably the telling of a nouveau riche family of hillbillies shaking up Beverly Hills in "The Beverly Hillbillies." His final writer credit was providing the original story for a 1982 version of the cop classic "Barney Miller." Wesson remained an actor until the very end, dropping in as a cab driver on several episodes of "The Beverly Hillbillies" and guest starring throughout the seventies on shows such as "Marcus Welby, M.D.," a medical drama about doctors who are eager to bring improved and personal care to a flawed system.