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Tuesday, March 19, 2024
March 19, 2024

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Dean Jones, boyish star of Disney films, dies at 84

Hit movies included 'The Love Bug,' 'That Darn Cat!'

The Columbian
Published:

LOS ANGELES — Dean Jones, whose boyish good looks and all-American manner made him Disney’s favorite young actor for such lighthearted films as “That Darn Cat!” and “The Love Bug,” has died of Parkinson’s disease. He was 84.

He died Monday in Los Angeles, Jones’ publicist Richard Hoffman said Wednesday.

Jones’ long association with The Walt Disney Co. began after he received an unexpected call from Walt Disney himself, who praised his work on the TV show “Ensign O’Toole,” noting it had “some good closing sequences.” Jones, himself a former Navy man, played the title role in the 1962 sitcom.

Two years later, Jones heard from Disney again, calling this time to offer him a role in “That Darn Cat!” opposite ing?nue Hayley Mills. His FBI agent Zeke Kelso follows a crime-solving cat that leads him to a pair of bank robbers.

Released in 1965, it would the first of 10 Disney films Jones would make, most of them in the supernatural vein.

“The Love Bug” (1969) was the most successful of the genre, with Jones playing a struggling race-driver who acquires a Volkswagen that wins races for him. The Bug, named Herbie, has hidden human traits, and when it feels unappreciated it disappears. Jones must rescue Herbie from the hands of his nefarious rival and issue the car an apology before it wins the big race for him.

After “The Love Bug,” Jones returned to the stage, winning the lead role of Robert in “Company,” Stephen Sondheim’s now-classic musical about marital angst, Manhattan-style.

In 1960, Jones made his Broadway debut with Jane Fonda in “There Was a Little Girl,” playing Fonda’s boyfriend in a short-lived drama about the rape of a young woman.

He had better luck on Broadway later in 1960, when he appeared in the hit comedy “Under the Yum Yum Tree.”

It was in Disney’s gentle family comedies, however, that Jones truly hit his stride.

In “Monkeys, Go Home,” Jones tried to teach four monkeys to pick grapes at a French vineyard he inherited. In “Million Dollar Duck,” he was a scientist with a duck that began laying golden eggs after being doused with radiation.

He returned to the Disney studio in 1977 for one more film, “Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo.”

Twenty years later, he had smaller parts in the remake of “That Darn Cat” and the TV version of “The Love Bug.”

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