February 03, 2005
"Wormer? Dead!"
John Vernon, veteran character actor best remembered as Dean Wormer in the 1978 classic Animal House has died. Saskatchewan -native Vernon played the perennial bad guy in movies from The Outlaw Josey Wales to Dirty Harry to Airplane II and television guest roles up through and including CSI.
Vernon was most recently seen in the special follow-up feature add-on to the "Double Secret Probation" Special Edition DVD of Animal House, which showed where the characters would be today. Dean Wormer was shown as a wheelchair-bound crochety old man in a nursing home.
John Vernon was 72, but nobody picked him; or scored on him in the Dead Pool.
I guess we're finally off of double-secret probation now.
He was a frequent guest villain on Mission Impossible; I think he may have even been a recurring character. Played a Castro-type dictator. One of the great gravel voices of all time.
Posted by: Pat Curley at February 3, 2005 09:59 PM