James Best
Acting
🎂 1926-07-26
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).
Cast credits(163)
Jim Lindsey
1960
Tom Carmody
1962
1958
Tucson, 'The Cowboy'
1963
1959
Sheriff Vern Schaler
1959
Allan Winford
1957
Martin Potter
1957
1958
1958
1957
Stoner
1958
Luke Perry
1958
Jethro Wyatt
1964
Jeff Myrtlebank
1959
Billy-Ben Turner
1959
1967
Ben Travers
1959
Joe
1960
Ted Evans
1959
Abel Waares
1959
1961
1957
1968
1960
Trenton
1962
1957
1955
1968
Rosco P. Coltrane
1979
1960
1959
Vince Zale
1965
1951
Joe Best
1958
Danny Dakota
1958
1959
Dan Murray
1963
1988
Shag
1954
Willie Cain
1959
Brock Quade
1959
Yale Barton
1966
1959
1959
Jovan Wilanskov
1959
1966
1956
1955
1958
1974
1955
Curt Westley
1962
1961
1962
1954
1952
1962
1964
1960
Fred Morgan
1955
Jack Milhoan
1957
1989
1960
1951
Beal
1955
Charlie Noon
1955
Webb
1958
1978
Norman Frayne
1955
Hennessy
1955
Bish Darby
1955
Bart Gentry
1960
Sheriff John Early
1973
1954
1996
1963
2005
Clem Wallace
1950
1950
Rosco Coltrane (voice)
1983
1952
Harry
1952
Slate Morley
1952
1980
1959
Boland
1959
Hardy Coulter
1953
Sheriff Charlie Young
1972
1951
Crewman (uncredited)
1956
Drew
1968
Texan
1977
Crater
1950
Lt. JG Jorgensen
1954
Carter, Rebel Soldier
1965
Billy John
1959
1966
Hank Larson
2006
Jim
1976
Cully
1978
Tom Folliard
1958
Lt. Robinson
1954
Millard Chilson Cassidy
1956
Stuart
1963
Thorne Sherman
1959
Pacemaker Patient
1978
Rosco P. Coltrane
2000
Thorne Sherman (archive footage)
2004
Frank Addison
1950
Sheriff Bert Hamilton
1974
Niergaard
1960
Paddy Kerrigan
2013
Lt. Finlay (uncredited)
1954
Rev. Emory Neill
1972
Sam Mullen
1959
Sergeant Carnavan
1967
Pellegrino
1976
Jim
1956
Thorne Sherman
2012
McClancy
2007
Kit Caswell
1958
Boss / Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane
1997
Self (archive footage)
2013
Cpl. Ransom
1952
Sgt. David Brent (archive footage) (uncredited)
2002
Cpl. Hassett
1952
Scotty Wade
1964
Cole Younger
1950
Bert Keon
1951
Corp. Gerad
1953
Ralph Elkins
1965
Dr. Ben Mizer
1966
Sam
1950
Bitter Creek Dalton
1952
Self
2021
Col. French's Orderly (uncredited)
1955
Rhidges
1958
1950
Sgt. David Brent
1959
Driver (uncredited)
1950
Bill Jackson
1956
Marvin Johnson
1952
Deputy Gig (uncredited)
1953
Wilbur Johnson
1998
Joe Rakich
1952
Sgt. Ralph Phelps
1951
Primrose
1953
Jerry Connell
1951
Private Bliss
1954
Kermit
1957
Hardy Coulter
1960
Barr
1954
Dewey Barksdale
1976
Ted Hamilton
1957
Dr. Sidney K. Fuller
1954
Jason Brown
1955
Henry Burroughs
1970
Jericho Larkin
1962
Det. Arnie Arnhoff
1956
Bingo Washington
1975
Doug Gerhardt
1957
1953
