MANNIX Star Mike Connors Dies at 91

Deadline reports that Mike Connors, best known as L.A. private eye on the long-running CBS crime drama MANNIX, passed away yesterday from leukemia at a hospital in Tarzana, CA. He was 91. The actor, who had been diagnosed with the disease only a week ago, was surrounded by his family when he passed.

His son-in-law, Mike Condon shared, "He was a wonderful father, a wonderful husband, a wonderful father-in-law and a wonderful friend. He was always there for anyone in need."

Connors' film career started in the early 1950s. Connors was cast in the critically acclaimed John Wayne film, Island in the Sky in which he was a crewman on one of the search-and-rescue planes. In 1956, still billed as Touch Connors, he played an Amalekite herder in Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments starring Charlton Heston.

He appeared in numerous television series, including the co-starring role in the 1955 episode "Tomas and the Widow" of the NBC Western anthology series Frontier. He guest-starred on the early sitcoms, Hey, Jeannie! and The People's Choice. He guest-starred in two Rod Cameron syndicated crime dramas, City Detective and the Western-themed State Trooper, and played the villain in the first episode filmed (but second one aired) of ABC's smash hit Maverick opposite James Garner in 1957.

In 1958, Connors appeared in the title role of the episode "Simon Pitt", the series finale of the NBC Western Jefferson Drum, starring Jeff Richards as a frontier newspaper editor. He also appeared in another NBC Western series, The Californians. That same year, Connors was cast as Miles Borden, a corrupt US Army lieutenant on NBC's Wagon Train in the episode "The Dora Gray Story", with Linda Darnell in the title role. He also appeared on an episode of NBC's Western series Cimarron City.

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