Ernest Borgnine dies

By The Associated Press

Ernest Borgnine, the beefy screen star known for blustery, often villainous roles, but who won the best-actor Oscar for playing against type as a lovesick butcher in "Marty" in 1955, died Sunday. He was 95.

His longtime spokesman, Harry Flynn, told The Associated Press that Borgnine died of renal failure at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center with his wife and children at his side.

Borgnine, who endeared himself to a generation of Baby Boomers with the 1960s TV comedy "McHale's Navy," first attracted notice in the early 1950s in villain roles, notably as the vicious Fatso Judson, who beat Frank Sinatra to death in "From Here to Eternity."

Then came "Marty," a low-budget film based on a Paddy Chayefsky television play that starred Rod Steiger. Borgnine played a 34-year-old who fears he is so unattractive he will never find romance. Then, at a dance, he meets a girl with the same fear.

"Sooner or later, there comes a point in a man's life when he's gotta face some facts," Marty movingly tells his mother at one point in the film. "And one fact I gotta face is that, whatever it is that women like, I ain't got it. I chased after enough girls in my life. I went to enough dances. I got hurt enough. I don't wanna get hurt no more."

Friends remember 'Goober Pyle' actor Lindsey

By JOE EDWARDS

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Actor George Lindsey was remembered Friday as the grinning Goober who made television viewers laugh for three decades on "The Andy Griffith Show" and "Hee Haw."

A public memorial service drew an estimated 400 people who paid last respects to Lindsey, 83, who died Sunday.

He was the beanie-wearing Goober on "The Andy Griffith Show" from 1964 to 1968 and its successor, "Mayberry RFD," from 1968 to 1971. He played the same jovial character, a mechanic, on "Hee Haw" from 1971 until it went out of production in 1993. Reruns of those shows are still seen on TV.

Actor Ernest Borgnine, Lindsey's close friend, sent a video tribute which was played at an informal gathering before the memorial. In it, Borgnine recalled the pranks they enjoyed playing down through the years. "We loved to outdo each other," Borgnine said. "It was like therapy."

Also shown at the casual gathering in the church's fellowship hall were clips from Lindsey on "Hee Haw."
One of them: "Where was Solomon's temple?" Minnie Pearl asked him.
"Right on the side of his head," Lindsey responded.