TinselTales: Murder "in the Family"

Archie and Edith Bunker. Television icons thanks to the unbel- ievable success of the Norman Lear sitcom All in the Family, which ran from 1971-1979 (thereupon followed by an augmented continuation, Archie Bunker's Place, until 1983, which was mostly without Edith.) Having segued through the loss of key characters such as daughter Gloria and son-in-law Mike, the show now had a new adolescent character called Stephanie in order to help generate new story lines. The episode, "The Return of Stephanie's Father" had the Bunkers grappling with the notion that their new little moppet was about to be reclaimed by her ne'er do well papa and taken to live in a derelict hotel.

Arriving at said hotel, Carroll O'Connor (as Archie) and Jean Stapleton (as Edith) are appalled. O'Connor doesn't even want to look at, much less smell, the place.

There's a careworn desk clerk checking people in by the hour rather than the night.

In the lobby are a couple of men of ill repute.

Finally, Stapleton and O'Connor are greeted by the tenant and soon try to find a place to sit and hash out the details of this sudden attempt at Stephanie's custody after having been in their care.

The desk clerk in this episode was portrayed by one Victor Kilian. Having begun acting on Broadway in the mid-1920s, he had proceeded to a film career (followed by much television) in an assortment of useful parts. At the time of this filming, he was just shy of 88 years of age.

The bum shown getting an earful from O'Connor was played by Charles Wagenheim. Wagenheim also acted on Broadway from the early-1920s to the late-1930s and then moved on to countless film roles. He then acted plentifully on television. He was nearly 84 at the time of this episode's filming.

The House of Frankenstein (1945)

Sadly, Wagenheim would not be among the viewers watching the March 25th, 1979 airing of this episode, "The Return of Stephanie's Father." On March 6th, he returned home to the Hollywood apartment he shared with his invalid wife to discover the young female nurse they'd hired to look after her going through their drawers attempting to steal! Caught in the act, she responded by bludgeoning the poor man to death (then calling to report that she'd "found him" that way.) Wagenheim's 50-year career included movies such as The Song of Bernadette (1943), The Spiral Staircase (1946), Executive Suite (1954), The Diary of Anne Frank (1959, as the thief who breaks into the factory below), Hello Dolly! (1969) and many, many others.

Blondie for Victory (1942)

I Escaped the Gestapo (1943)

Canyon Crossroads (1955)

Perhaps his most notable role of all, as the assassin in the famous umbrella sequence of Alfred Hitchcock's Foreign Correspondent (1940.)

But the horror doesn't stop there. Wagenheim was murdered on March 6th, which happened to be the 88th birthday of his recent costar Victor Kilian. Kilian had to have been distressed to hear of the murder of a recent coworker. But he didn't have time to fret... On March 11th, he too was found beaten to death in his luxury apartment! Like Wagenheim, he found himself at the mercy of a burglar or burglars who had intruded while he was watching TV. Five days apart, one mile away from one another, these longtime performers and recent coworkers were gone.

The woman who killed Wagenheim, ironically named Stephanie, was sentenced to only 8 years in prison for the senseless killing of the veteran actor. God only knows what she actually served after her voluntary manslaughter plea deal... There wound up being no direct correlation between the two killings.

With Patricia Hitchcock in Broadway's Solitaire.

Killian had worked on many, many movies including Ramona (1936), The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1938), Only Angels Have Wings (1939), Reap the Wild Wind (1942), Gentleman's Agreement (1947) and many others. It all came screeching to a halt when he was blacklisted during the McCarthy witch hunt in the early-1950s. However, he was able to resume a Broadway career (including a turn in Look Homeward, Angel with Miriam Hopkins and Andrew Prine) until TV came along with its employment opportunities.

In his day, Kilian could boast featured billing in movies like Bad Boy (1935.)

King of the Lumberjacks (1940)

Kilian got a late-career boost as the father of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, a Norman Lear sitcom with a cult following.

As a lascivious old coot (and "The Fernwood Flasher!"), he made quite an impression on viewers.

This is indeed a more gruesome post than we might typically put up, but it is mere weeks from Halloween, after all, so the time is sort of right in a way.  What are the chances of these still-active, octogenarian actors meeting their fates in these awful ways after enjoying such long careers on screen? It just isn't fair. My mind was blown when I found out about this, though, and wanted to share.