Another link to our childhood has been broken with the death of American actor Andy Griffith; after all, who of our age group could ever forget this:
But there was far more to Andy Griffith than just his self-titled show; CNN reports:
Actor Andy Griffith, who played folksy Sheriff Andy Taylor in the fictional town of Mayberry, died Tuesday at the age of 86, his family said.Griffith died at about 7 a.m. at his home on Roanoke Island, according to Dare County, North Carolina, Sheriff J.D. "Doug" Doughtie.He passed away after an unspecified illness and "has been laid to rest on his beloved Roanoake Island," the family said in a statement."Andy was a person of incredibly strong Christian faith and was prepared for the day he would be called Home to his Lord," his wife, Cindi Griffith, said in the statement issued through the Andy Griffith Museum in Mount Airy, North Carolina.Best known for his role on "The Andy Griffith Show," the University of North Carolina music graduate also starred as a murder-solving Southern attorney in the television series "Matlock" during the 1980s and 1990s. He was also known for his roles in movies and on the stage, as a producer and as a Grammy Award-winning gospel singer.
And the Ronny Howard whose name appears in the opening credits is of course acclaimed actor and director Ron Howard, who has paid his own tribute:
Actor and director Ron Howard, who played Griffith's son, Opie Taylor, on "The Andy Griffith Show," said he is "forever grateful" to the actor."His pursuit of excellence and the joy he took in creating served generations & shaped my life," Howard said on Twitter.
Rest peacefully Andy, and thanks for the memories.
4 comments:
That music takes me back to my childhood - is it selective memory or were programmes then a lot more innocent than they are now?
I don't think it's selective memory at all Ele. Programmes like Andy Griffith, My Three Sons, I Love Lucy and the Beverley Hillbillies were wholesome family entertainment that reflected societal values and mores of the time. It all started to turn around 1967 with Flower Power, and the onset of the permissive society. And in many ways, we've gone downhill since then.
I was thinking about Andy Griffiths death as I drove to work this morning.
Some-one mentioned his character "Matlock" was better known than his role in the Andy Griffith show.
My thought was who was Matlock? I only remembered Andy Griffith.
Elle is right.
The US TV programs of the late '60s (when I first saw television) and the early '70s were far more innocent, even "Greenacres" with Za Za Gabor than those from the later '70s.
I have watched episodes of the Andy Griffith Show on YouTube and rather than finding them quaint and naive as I expected they were surprisingly still relevant and entertaining. The themes were often around treating others with tolerance, commonsense parenting and sound values -things we need more of now.
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