![\"George_Kennedy_1975\"](\"http:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975-465x720.jpg\")
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Oscar-winning American actor George Kennedy, best know for appearances in the\u00a0Airport<\/em> and Naked Gun<\/em> franchises, has passed away.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Following his stage d\u00e9but at aged 2, George Kennedy’s acting career never took off until he left a 16 year career in the military due to a back injury. Appearing first in a bit-part in Kubrick’s Spartacus<\/em>, Kennedy would find his profile growing with successive feature film appearance – Charade<\/em> (1963), Straight Jacket<\/em> (1964), The Flight of The Phoenix<\/em> (1965) and In Harms Way<\/em> (1965) among others – while a steady roster of television appearances gave him prominence. Roles in The Andy Griffith Show, Peter Gunn, Bonanza<\/em> and Maverick<\/em>, as well as a guest star turn in an episode of Perry Mason<\/em>, paved the way for larger film roles, including his Academy Award-winning turn in Cool Hand Luke<\/em>, as Dragline, opposite Paul Newman.<\/p>\n With a profile befitting his talent, Kennedy went on to appear in The Dirty Dozen<\/em> (1967), Bandolero<\/em> (1968) and The Boston Strangler<\/em> (1970), before he hooked up with the big budget (and Oscar nominated) disaster film, Airport<\/em> (1970) – a franchise consisting of a further three\u00a0sequels, in which Kennedy appeared; Airport 1975, Airport ’77,<\/em> and The Concorde: Airport ’79<\/em>.<\/p>\n Kennedy found his way into the eye of Clint Eastwood, appearing in both Thunderbolt and Lightfoot<\/em>, and The Eiger Sanction<\/em>, as well as a number of ensemble films including Earthquake<\/em> and Murder On The Nile<\/em>, while smaller roles opposite Chuck Norris in The Delta Force<\/em>, Lance Henricksen in Savage Dawn<\/em>, and in the mix for Creepshow 2<\/em>, kept him busy. It would be his co-star turn opposite Leslie Nielsen, in The Naked Gun<\/em>, and its two sequels, for which modern audiences best associate him, playing\u00a0Captain Hocken opposite Nielsen’s bumbling Frank Drummond.<\/p>\n A recurring role in Dallas<\/em>, as well as a number of smaller film and television roles, saw out the rest of his career.<\/p>\n George Kennedy passed away on February 28th, aged 91.<\/p>\n Oscar-winning American actor George Kennedy, best know for appearances in the\u00a0Airport and Naked Gun franchises,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48482,"featured_media":41849,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[213],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-obituary"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",707,1095,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975-194x300.jpg",194,300,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",640,991,false],"large":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975-465x720.jpg",465,720,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",707,1095,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",707,1095,false],"covernews-featured":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",707,1095,false],"covernews-medium":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",220,340,false],"profile_24":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",15,24,false],"profile_48":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",31,48,false],"profile_96":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",62,96,false],"profile_150":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",97,150,false],"profile_300":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",194,300,false],"sow-carousel-default":["https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/George_Kennedy_1975.jpg",118,182,false]},"author_info":{"display_name":"Rodney Twelftree","author_link":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/author\/rodney\/"},"category_info":"Obituary<\/a>","tag_info":"Obituary","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48482"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41848"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41848\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"OJ](\"http:\/\/www.fernbyfilms.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/368471_full-720x489.jpg\")