Richard Crenna

In his three-and-a-half-hour interview, Richard Crenna (1926-2003) talks about his early years as a busy radio actor in Hollywood. He speaks fondly about the radio community and his work with some of the top comic talents of the era. Crenna lists his various regular roles in radio including teenager "Oogie Pringle" in A Date with Judy, which he demonstrates briefly. He describes developing a sense of comic rhythm in radio that influenced his later work as an actor and director in television. He discusses in great detail his appearance as "Walter Denton" in the sitcom Our Miss Brooks, "Luke McCoy" in the rural sitcom The Real McCoys, and "James Slattery" in the political drama Slattery's People. Crenna also speaks of his work as a director, notably helming episodes of The Andy Griffith Show. He describes his later television work executive-producing Make Room for Granddaddy, and appearing in the miniseries Centennial, the sitcom All's Fair, the sitcom It Takes Two, and the telefilm The Rape of Richard Beck, the latter of which won him an Emmy award. He also talks about his feature films, working with director Robert Wise in The Sand Pebbles and director Lawrence Kasdan in Body Heat. He then talks about playing the role for which he is most identified, "Colonel Trautman" in the Rambo movies. Finally, he briefly discusses his recurring character on the television drama series Judging Amy. Henry Colman conducted the interview on April 3, 2002 in Los Angeles, CA.