James Best
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
James Best (born Jewel Franklin Guy; July 26, 1926 – April 6, 2015) was an American television, film, character, voice, and stage actor, as well as a writer, director, acting coach, artist, college professor, and musician, whose career spanned seven decades of television. He appeared as a guest on various country music and talk shows.
One of the busiest actors in Hollywood, who began his contract career with Universal Studios in 1949, where he met unfamiliar actors Julie Adams, Piper Laurie, Tony Curtis and Rock Hudson. Best's long career began in films in 1950. He appeared primarily in Westerns, playing opposite Audie Murphy in Kansas Raiders (1950), The Cimarron Kid (1952) and The Quick Gun (1964), Raymond Massey in Seven Angry Men (1955), George Montgomery in Last of the Badman (1957), Frank Lovejoy in Cole Younger Gunfighter (1958), and Randolph Scott in Ride Lonesome (1959). He also starred in the science fiction cult movie, The Killer Shrews (1959) and its sequel, Return of the Killer Shrews (2012). He is most known for playing bumbling Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane in the action/comedy Dukes of Hazzard, a role that he revised in The Dukes of Hazzard: Reunion! (1997) as his character was now "boss" of Hazzard County as well as sheriff, and again in The Dukes of Hazzard: Hazzard in Hollywood (2000).
Known for
Perry Mason
Allan Winford
Perry Mason
Martin Potter
Bonanza
Sheriff Vern Schaler
The Twilight Zone
Jeff Myrtlebank
The Twilight Zone
Billy-Ben Turner
The Alfred Hitchcock Hour
Tom Carmody
The Fugitive
Dan Murray
The Andy Griffith Show
Jim Lindsey
The Rifleman
Have Gun, Will Travel
Cheyenne
The Virginian
Curt Westley
Climax!
Shag
Combat!
Trenton
Rawhide
Willie Cain
Rawhide
Brock Quade
Ben Casey
Daniel Boone
Jethro Wyatt
Gunsmoke
Beal
Gunsmoke
Charlie Noon
Wanted: Dead or Alive
Stoner
Wanted: Dead or Alive
Luke Perry
Burke's Law
Tucson, 'The Cowboy'
Surfside 6
The Dukes of Hazzard
Rosco P. Coltrane
Hawaiian Eye
Laramie
77 Sunset Strip
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
Norman Frayne
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
Hennessy
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
Bish Darby
Black Saddle
Ben Travers
The Texan
The Rebel
Ted Evans
The Rebel
Abel Waares
In the Heat of the Night
Trackdown
Bat Masterson
Joe Best
Bat Masterson
Danny Dakota
Bronco
Tombstone Territory
Lock-Up
Richard Diamond, Private Detective
Jack Milhoan
West Point
Lancer
The Mod Squad
Clay Lynch
Felony Squad
Flipper
The Guns of Will Sonnett
The Gene Autry Show
The Millionaire
Fred Morgan
One Way Street
Driver (uncredited)
Death Mask
Wilbur Johnson
The Green Hornet
Yale Barton
The Barbara Stanwyck Show
Joe
Honey West
Vince Zale
Man on the Prowl
Doug Gerhardt
Moondance Alexander
McClancy
Peggy
Frank Addison
Centennial
Comanche Territory
Sam
Steel Town
Joe Rakich
The DuPont Show with June Allyson
Jovan Wilanskov
They Rode West
Lt. Finlay (uncredited)
Lux Video Theatre
Clem Wallace
Run, Simon, Run
Henry Burroughs
The Savage Bees
Pellegrino
Startime
Air Cadet
Jerry Connell
The Manhunter
Hopalong Cassidy
Enos
Stagecoach West
Hooper
Cully
The Yellow Tomahawk
Private Bliss
Cavalcade of America
Cavalcade of America
Harry
Cavalcade of America
Slate Morley
Stories of the Century
Hawkins
Sheriff John Early
Frontier
Sounder
Sheriff Charlie Young
The Gallant Men
The Adventures of Kit Carson
Whispering Smith
Ride Lonesome
Billy John
Gaby
Jim
General Electric True
Black Spurs
Ralph Elkins
B.L. Stryker
Buffalo Bill Jr.
The Runaway Barge
Bingo Washington
Men Into Space
Forbidden Planet
Crewman (uncredited)
Behind Closed Doors
Webb
I Was a Shoplifter
City of Bad Men
Deputy Gig (uncredited)
Redigo
Savages
Sheriff Bert Hamilton
The Cimarron Kid
Bitter Creek Dalton
Top of the World
Col. French's Orderly (uncredited)
Michael Shayne
The Sweeter Side of Life
Paddy Kerrigan
Aftermath
Hardy Coulter
Hallmark Hall of Fame
Hawk
Overland Trail
Seminole
Corp. Gerad
The Left Handed Gun
Tom Folliard
The Dukes of Hazzard: Reunion!
Boss / Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane
Pony Express
Bart Gentry
The Dukes
Rosco Coltrane (voice)
Rolling Thunder
Texan
The Lineup
Verboten!
Sgt. David Brent
Come Next Spring
Bill Jackson
Winchester '73
Crater
The Caine Mutiny
Lt. JG Jorgensen
Shock Corridor
Stuart
The Naked and the Dead
Rhidges
Firecreek
Drew
E! True Hollywood Story
CMT: Inside Fame
Shenandoah
Carter, Rebel Soldier
Schlitz Playhouse of Stars
General Electric Theater
Hardy Coulter
The David Niven Show
Boland
The Man and the Challenge
Kansas Raiders
Cole Younger
The Rack
Millard Chilson Cassidy
Cast a Long Shadow
Sam Mullen
Nickelodeon
Jim
Hot Tamale
Hank Larson
The Dukes of Hazzard: Hazzard in Hollywood
Rosco P. Coltrane
Apache Drums
Bert Keon
The Battle at Apache Pass
Cpl. Hassett
The Raid
Lt. Robinson
Target Unknown
Sgt. Ralph Phelps
The End
Pacemaker Patient
The Killer Shrews
Thorne Sherman
Francis Goes to West Point
Corporal Ransom
Three on a Couch
Dr. Ben Mizer
Column South
Primrose
The Quick Gun
Scotty Wade
First to Fight
Sergeant Carnavan
Ode to Billy Joe
Dewey Barksdale
Skip Taylor
Seven Angry Men
Jason Brown
Calling Homicide
Det. Arnie Arnhoff
Ma and Pa Kettle at the Fair
Marvin Johnson
Return of the Killer Shrews
Thorne Sherman
Hot Summer Night
Kermit
The Men Who Made the Movies: Samuel Fuller
Sgt. David Brent (archive footage) (uncredited)
Hollywood in the Atomic Age: Monsters! Martians! Mad Scientists!
Self
Cole Younger, Gunfighter
Kit Caswell
The Mountain Road
Niergaard
Black Gold
Jericho Larkin
Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia
Self (archive footage)
Riders to the Stars
Dr. Sidney K. Fuller
Return from the Sea
Barr
The Brain Machine
Rev. Emory Neill
Last of the Badmen
Ted Hamilton