Passing : Charles Lane, Hollywood Character Actor, Age 102

From The New York Times:

By Robert Berkvist
Published: July 11, 2007

Charles Lane was a veteran character actor whose lean frame and stern features were familiar to millions of movie and television fans, most of whom, it is safe to say, never knew his name.

Remeber the expectant father in the waiting room on I Love Lucy when Little Ricky was born ?
That was the guy.

You might alo remember him from "It's A wonderful Life", "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington", "The Beverly Hillbillies" or "Petticoat Junction".

His bony physique, craggy face and the authoritarian or supercilious way he would peer through his spectacles at his fellow actors eventually led to his being typecast and locked into playing a succession of lawyers, judges, assorted lawmen and other abrasive roles. It was, he said in an interview, “stupid and unfair” to be called upon to play the same kinds of roles over and over again.

“It didn’t give me a chance,” he said. But, he added, “it made the casting easier for the studio.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/11/movies/11lane.html?_r=1&ref=obituaries&oref=slogin