| Wesley Eure | |
|---|---|
| Born | August 17, 1951 Baton Rouge, Louisiana, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actor, director, producer, writer |
| Years active | 1965–present |
| Website | |
| http://www.wesleyeure.info/Wesley_Eure/Welcome.html | |
Wesley Eure (born August 17, 1951) is an American actor.
Eure came to prominence when he appeared in two long running television series in the 1970s, Days of our Lives and Land of the Lost. For several years, he appeared in both shows simultaneously. Eure is also a singer, author, producer, director, charity fundraiser, and lecturer.
Contents |
Eure's childhood was spent in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, where he dreamed of being in show business from the age of five, and starred as an oak tree in an elementary school play. He studied acting in the theatre arts department at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and at summer workshops at Southern Illinois University and Northwestern University. His first break came when he was working part-time at a Las Vegas hotel selling paintings. There he met Robert Goulet, who hired Eure as a production assistant for the Goulet-Carol Lawrence summer tour.
The tour terminated in New York City. After a few short months of auditions and odd jobs (including computerized astrology predictions), Eure became a cast member at the American Shakespeare Festival in Stratford, Connecticut. He joined such notables as Jane Alexander and Sada Thompson in The Tempest, Mourning Becomes Electra, Merry Wives of Windsor, and Twelfth Night, as well as many original works produced by the company. At the Bucks County Playhouse in Pennsylvania, he performed in West Side Story and then joined a musical comedy revue and traveled throughout the East Coast resort areas.
After moving to Los Angeles, Eure was hired to star in Kaye Ballard's projected new series, The Organic Vegetables, created and produced by the team who did The Monkees. Subsequently, Eure was hired to replace David Cassidy on The Partridge Family, but the show was canceled before a new season started.
For eight years, he starred in NBC-TV's Emmy-winning Days of our Lives, playing the role of Mike Horton. He also starred as Will Marshall in Sid and Marty Krofft's popular children's adventure series, Land of the Lost, which led NBC's Saturday morning line-up for three years.
Eure co-produced, wrote and acted in Fox Television's hidden-camera shows Totally Hidden Video and Payback. He also wrote and directed Spy TV for NBC. He was the host of Nickelodeon game show Finders Keepers. He co-created PBS Kids’s Emmy-nominated animated series for preschoolers called Dragon Tales, now in its sixth year. It is produced by The Children’s Television Workshop and Sony Pictures.
Eure also hosted an educational DVD called Power Over Poison to teach kids how to avoid poisons, produced by WQED, the PBS station in Pittsburgh. Eure was a regular on such game shows as Password and Match Game. Channel 9 TV in Australia hired Wesley to be the permanent host of their Tonight Show, but lost a ten-month immigration battle with Actor's Equity in Australia.
Eure received top billing in Hanna-Barbera's comedy C.H.O.M.P.S, which also starred Valerie Bertinelli, Red Buttons, Jim Backus, Hermione Baddeley and Conrad Bain. He appeared as the fiendish murderer in The Toolbox Murders and the nasty guy who gets eaten by snakes in Jennifer. About his time filming Jennifer, Eure claims he had a difficult time working with the various snakes on set, including the large Boa snake that features during the climax.[1]
According to his website and a recent interview, Eure and his Land of the Lost co-star, Kathy Coleman will no longer have cameo appearances in the 2009 film, Land of the Lost starring Will Ferrell, as they were edited out of the final cut. [1]
His children's novel The Red Wings of Christmas, published by Pelican, has been called "the new American classic" by CNN, and was optioned by Disney for a full-length animated feature. The book was illustrated by Ron Palillo--Arnold Horshack on the 1970s TV series Welcome Back, Kotter.
Wesley’s fifth book, A Fish Out of Water, is his first pre-schooler book. The story of a bird and a fish that fall in love and make it work, it is used by schools to teach racial tolerance. The graduate art students at Meredith College in Raleigh, North Carolina illustrate it. His new book, The Whale That Ate the Storm, will soon be released.
Knightsbridge Publishing released two of his humor books, Fun with Fax and On-the-Wall Off-the-Wall Office Humor.