Carl Betz | More Than a Stick of Furniture

These encomiums were not lavished upon Edwin Booth or John Barrymore or Charles Laughton or even George Maharis, but upon an actor named Carl Betz, whose principal claim to what dubious fame he enjoys is that for the past five years he has, as someone has said, “labored in profitable anonymity” as Donna Reed’s husband in her ABC series. It need hardly be added that such accolades were not inspired by his performance in Miss Reed’s show. They appeared two years ago when, for four months, he fled his television family each weekend to take the leads in two avante-garde one-act plays—“Krapp’s Last Tape,” by Samuel Beckett, and “The Zoo Story,” by Edward Albee—at the Stage Society in Los Angeles.

‘Tremendously exciting moment’

In neither play was his role even remotely like the amalgam of Dagwood Bumstead and Robert Young which he essays on The Donna Reed Show. In the Beckett play, he appeared as a dying recluse who delivers what amounts to a 45-minute monolog. Then, after intermission, he came back in “The Zoo Story” as a mousy publisher accosted by a suicidal young man whom he eventually kills. Unlikely as such strong stuff may sound to devotees of Dr. Alex Stone (his TV role), to Mr. Betz it was “a tremendously exciting moment.”

But he also insists that his role in The Donna Reed Show is “very satisfying”—the sort of statement which is conventionally made by the Whitney Blakes, Abby Daltons, Marjorie Lords and others with secondary roles. Since Donna Reed is not as dominating a personality as Shirley Booth, Joey Bishop or Danny Thomas, Betz does have an opportunity to display the flair for comedy which he developed in his pre-TV days with touring companies of “The Voice of the Turtle” and “The Seven-Year Itch.” Donna Reed says, “I honestly don’t know what we would have done if we hadn’t found Carl.” Her husband, producer Tony Owen says, “Show me another actor who’s never late one day for five years, who always knows his lines and who never gives any trouble.”

These words have an odor of the left-handed compliment and this point up the negative aspects of a role such as that played by Betz. He enjoys few of the prerogatives and little of the fame bestowed on some movie stars, who have not been seen by as many people in their entire careers as watch Betz perform every week.

Betz has been an actor since was 10 years old and put on plays in his grandmother’s basement in Pittsburgh, the city where he was born on March 9, 1921 (he is a couple of months younger than Donna Reed). He was one of a troupe of six youngsters who created their own productions by passing a lined notebook and pencil around and writing their own lines.

In high school, he joined forces with another group of theatrically inclined juveniles, who ambitiously called themselves the Theater Guild (“I was always the best actor in the group”). They built a stage in a church basement and got lighting and other equipment donated. Ignoring their class play, they put on a production of their own called “The Enemy,” of which Betz says, “It was a tirade against all the established institutions, including the churh. If anybody from that church had ever bothered to come down and see what we were doing, they would have thrown us out.”

Charles Coburn slept here

After high school, he received a four-year scholarship to Duquesne University, which he attended for only one year; then, after a season of summer stock, he transferred to Carnegie Tech. At the end of another year, in 1942, he was drafted into the Army and spent more than three years in North Africa and Italy, ending up as a sergeant with the engineers.

He returned to Carnegie Tech after the war and completed his dramatic course there. A short stint as a radio announcer was followed by 65 weeks of appearances in East Coast stock companies. He had one try at Broadway in something called “The Long Watch.” The late Charles Coburn was one of the owners of the production. “He decided to direct one scene,” Betz says. “He fell asleep while we were rehearsing and started snoring—which gives you an idea how good the show was.” It played only 12 performances on Broadway, but during this time Betz fell in love with an actress named Lois Harmon, whom he married on June 20, 1952. Now divorced, they have a son, Richard, 6, who spends weekends at Betz’s Malibu apartment.

Doctor with a difference

The short run of “The Long Watch” was followed by tours with Veronica Lake and Diana Barrymore; a brief contract with 20th Century-Fox during which Betz appeared in seven films; the road again, this time with Walter Slezak in “My Three Angels”; and eventually 18 months in a television soap opera entitled Love of Life—all of which makes it understandable that Betz would enjoy the peace, quiet and comparative security of The Donna Reed Show.

As Miss Reed’s husband, he is supposed to be a pediatrician. Even he does not take the characterization seriously, and he seems ill at east, like President Kennedy wearing a hat, when he has to carry the doctor’s black bag. He says, “I am just a man who happens to be a pediatrician.” In one episode, actress Binnie Barnes looked at Betz in surprise and said, “You don’t look like a doctor.”

She did not add that what he does look like is an actor. Of course, there may be many doctors who look like actors, but actors who plays doctors are generally in the Jean Hersholt-Milburn Stone pattern—shaggy, rumpled, gruff but lovable. When Dr. Stone, who does not otherwise resemble Milburn, runs his hand through his hair, he is careful not to disturb the boyish look which usually hangs with studied casualness over his brow (Betz’s hairline is receding, and he wears a toupee while on camera). His actions are often most unprofessional—except in the sense that acting is a profession: He mugs, pops his eyes, does exaggerated “double takes,” and is not above purely physical bits which come close to being pratfalls. As for that most important characteristic of the theatrical, family practitioner, being lovable, he goes it one better: He has sex appeal.

“Women all over the country are crazy about him,” says Donna Reed, whose daughter, only a year old when the show first when on the air, proudly tells her little friends, “My mommy is going steady!”

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