Tim Conway Dies at Age 85

Tim Conway, five-time Emmy Award winning actor and TV host has passed away at the age of 85.

Conway was best known for his gigs on Harvey Korman and The Carol Burnett Show. He passed away in Los Angeles, having been rendered mute after undergoing brain surgery last year.

Conway had studied TV and radio at Bowling State University before he enlisted in the army. He often shared stories of his tie in the service, prompting laughs with his enthusiasm from those around him.

“I looked in the garbage and there was this long neon tube,” Conway recalled (via People). “So I took that. As the lieutenant came around the corner. I said, ‘Halt.’ I am pointing this bulb at him and he said ‘What is that?’ I said, ‘It’s a light bulb and if you come any closer, I’ll turn it on.’ He had very little sense of humor. I spent an extra two weeks [in the service] painting rocks in Seattle.”

After exiting the military, Conway went on to work at a local station in Cleveland which would lead to his impressive Hollywood career. “I had no professional training. I had a sense of humor and had been in front of a microphone,” Conway said of his career’s early days on an episode of The Interviews: An Oral History of Television in 2004.

He would go on to earn his own sitcom in the form of The Tim Conway Show for one season in 1970 before a variety show of the same name in 1980-81. He also appeared on McHale’s Navy and voiced Barnacle Boy on the animated SpongeBob Squarepants series. After appearing on the second season of 30 Rock, he earned an Emmy for the role.

Conway was born on December 15, 1933.