"Benson" has passed away.... Robert Guillaume, dead at 89

[rhett7660]

Very sad...... What is even more strange is me and the wife were just talking about him.

RIP Mr. Guillaume.

Forgot the link:
http://variety.com/2017/tv/news/robert-guillaume-dead-dies-benson-1202598171/

 

[loby]

Very sad...... What is even more strange is me and the wife were just talking about him.

RIP Mr. Guillaume.

I remember in the mid 90’s in L.A. a friend had tickets to the Phantom of the Opera. I said great! Wanted to see Michael Crawford.

When I got there they announced that they had a replacement for the show and it was Robert Guillaume. I said, “What...isn’t that the guy who played “Benson”???”. Crawford made the role famous at the time and anyone who would replaced him had big shoes to fill...

Well...Robert did incredible and the whole theatre at the end gave a very very long standing ovation. He was great! I did not know he had a wonderful operatic voice..and what acting! He went on to be the phantom for sometime I believe. He was an all around actor, singer and voice over artist.

R.I.P.

 

[rhett7660]

I remember in the mid 90’s in L.A. a friend had tickets to the Phantom of the Opera. I said great! Wanted to see Michael Crawford.

When I got there they announced that they had a replacement for the show and it was Robert Guillaume. I said, “What...isn’t that the guy who played “Benson”???”. Crawford made the role famous at the time and anyone who would replaced him had big shoes to fill...

Well...Robert did incredible and the whole theatre at the end gave a very very long standing ovation. He was great! I did not know he had a wonderful operatic voice..and what acting! He went on to be the phantom for sometime I believe. He was an all around actor, singer and voice over artist.

R.I.P.

I never knew he did this type of work, but then again, I really only knew him from Soap and Benson, which are two shows I loved growing up. Of course I mainly saw them in reruns when I was a little older to actually understand a lot of the jokes.

 

[Thomas Veil]

I was only a moderate fan of Soap and not at all of Benson, but I loved Guillaume from Sports Night. Even after his stroke (which was worked into the show) he was marvelous as Isaac Jaffe. SN surprised me by showing me the man's acting range...and then to learn here that he could also sing? I would like to have seen that.

One of my favorite Guillaume lines from SN is: "You know I love you, don't you, Danny? And it's because I love you that I can say this: no rich white boy ever got anywhere with me by comparing himself to Rosa Parks." Looking at it here, it reads like it should be funny, but it's not. It's delivered dead serious, after Josh Charles' character draws a racially inappropriate parallel between his own predicament and that of Ms. Parks.