John David Carson
Carson in The Savage is Loose (1974)
Born	John Franklin Carson[1] (1952-03-06)March 6, 1952 Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Died	October 27, 2009(2009-10-27) (aged 57) Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S.
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1966–1990

John David Carson (born John Franklin Carson; March 6, 1952 – October 27, 2009) was an American actor. He was born in Los Angeles, California.

Career

Carson began his career at a young age, acting in television advertisements, and later doing cartoon voice-acting for Hanna-Barbera. His first job was the voice of "Dino Boy/Todd" in 18 episodes of "Space Ghost" from 1966-1968, billed as Johnny Carson. He attended Los Angeles Valley College where he played a lead role in its 1969 production of The Taming Of The Shrew. Upon beginning his Hollywood career he was immediately engaged in a dispute with Johnny Carson over the use of their shared name - he subsequently went by the name John David Carson.

Carson's first feature film was Pretty Maids All in a Row in 1971. Carson portrayed "Ponce de Leon Harper", a nerdy and sexually inexperienced young man who is tormented with lust at the pretty young women around him at school and suffers from chronic priapism. Ponce is eventually "mentored" by his guidance counselor, played by Rock Hudson, an expert at seducing younger women, who takes him under his wing and persuades an attractive female teacher (played by Angie Dickinson) to sleep with him.^[2] Another notable role was in the 1976 film Stay Hungry, alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jeff Bridges and Sally Field. Carson also appeared in a great deal of television productions, including Hawaii Five-O and Charlie's Angels. He portrayed "Jay Spence" on Falcon Crest, a prime-time soap opera.

He played "Larry Burns", a television repairman who is briefly framed for a woman's murder by a corrupt sheriff on Murder She Wrote and an Irish jockey named "Kevin Ryan" on Charlie's Angels. He appeared in various B-movies such as Empire of the Ants (1977), an adaptation of an H. G. Wells story about gigantic, man-eating ants, Creature from Black Lake (1976), Charge of the Model T's (1977) and The Fifth Floor (1978), and acted alongside George C. Scott in The Day of the Dolphin (1973). He again appeared opposite Scott, playing his character's son, in The Savage is Loose (1974). Carson continued acting in small parts until 1990, appearing in the Julia Roberts hit Pretty Woman, which marked his last appearance on film. He voluntarily retired from acting after this role.

Personal life

Carson was of Irish and Cherokee ancestry, the son of Western actor Eldridge "Kit" Carson (1909–1978) and his wife, Rosemonde (née James) Carson, a fashion model. He was born on March 6, 1952, at the now-closed Queen of Angels Hospital in Los Angeles. The home where his parents resided and where he lived as a child was located at 634 North Fuller Avenue.

Carson entered Hollywood from a theater background; at the time of his arrival on the motion-picture scene, he had already undergone several traumatic incidents. His parents had split; he had been involved in a serious motorcycle accident which left him almost completely deaf in one ear, according to an interview in Interview.^[3]

Filmography

References

External links

• John David Carson at IMDb