Ted Knight

Actor

Ted Knight played buffoonish and bombastic newscaster Ted Baxter on The Mary Tyler Moore Show from 1970-77. Knight won two Emmys and stole countless scenes on the show, which was one of the highest-rated comedies of its era. White-haired and firm-jawed, Knight made something of a specialty of pompous egotists; he played the hilarious Judge Smails in the 1980 film Caddyshack. Knight later starred in the sitcom Too Close For Comfort (1980-86), which morphed into The Ted Knight Show shortly before his death in 1986.

Extra credit: Knight had a small nonspeaking part as a guard at the end of Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 film Psycho... Too Close for Comfort was based on a British series, Keep It in the Family... Some sources list Knight's real name as Tadeus Wladyslaw Konopka or Tadewurz Wladzui Konopka; his gravestone, however, reads Theodore C. Konopka.

Other sitcom stars of the Knight's era: Gary Burghoff of M*A*S*H, Gary Coleman of Diff'rent Strokes and Freddie Prinze of Chico and the Man.