Richard B. Shull

Richard Bruce Shull (February 24, 1929 – October 14, 1999) was an American character actor.

Early life

Shull was born in Evanston, Illinois, the son of Zana Marie (née Brown), a court stenographer, and Ulysses Homer Shull, a manufacturing executive. Shull attended York High School in Elmhurst, Illinois; the University of Iowa; and served in the U.S. Army before starting his Broadway career as a stage manager.

Acting career

He got his first big break as an actor when he was cast in Minnie's Boys in 1970. Additional theatre credits include Goodtime Charley (in which he sang a duet "Merci, Bon Dieu"; and for which he received Tony and Drama Desk Award nominations), Fools, The Front Page, A Flea in Her Ear, and Victor/Victoria.

Shull's screen credits include thirty movies, The Anderson Tapes (1971), Klute (1971), Slither (1973), The Fortune (1975), Splash (1984), Garbo Talks (1984), Unfaithfully Yours (1984), Housesitter (1992) and Private Parts (1997).

His television appearances included Love, American Style in episode "Love and the Locksmith", Ironside "Once More for Joey" aired 1974, Good Times "The Visitor", The Rockford Files "The Great Blue Lake", Alice "Flo's Chili Reception", Diana co star, Lou Grant episode "Samaratan", Hart to Hart, and Holmes & Yo-Yo starred as a police detective, as well as numerous television movies. He also appeared as the judge in an MTV music video, "Keeping the Faith" (1984), by Billy Joel.

Writing career

As a writer, Shull wrote the 1960 play "Fenton's Folly", which was adapted as "Fentons völlig verrückte Erfindung" (1967), an independent German movie filmed in Austria. He also wrote the story for the 1966 thriller movie "Aroused", and co-wrote drama movie "Pamela, Pamela You are..." (1968) with writer William L. Rose.

Death

Shull died of a heart attack while appearing in the play Epic Proportions in New York City.

In a 2012 interview, Shull's Holmes & Yo-Yo co-star John Schuck remembered him as "a very funny actor and a unique man," adding that Shull "lived in the ’40s. He bought ’40s clothing, he only used pen and ink, he had his own railroad car which he would attach to trains and travel around the country. He had a 1949 Chevrolet car. I mean, he truly lived in the past. Quite remarkable."

In 1995, Shull co-founded the North American Araucanian Royalist Society (NAARS) with Daniel Paul Morrison. The NAARS studies the Kingdom of Araucania and Patagonia which was founded in 1860 by the Mapuche people of South America. The NAARS devoted a large portion of issue number 10 of their official journal, The Steel Crown, to the life of Shull.