Whitney Rydbeck, the actor greatest identified for his position in Jason Lives: Friday the thirteenth Half VI and for starring as an authentic crash check dummy in Nineteen Eighties security belt commercials, has died. He was 79.
Rydbeck died on Monday, July 15, resulting from problems from prostate most cancers whereas in hospice care in Chatsworth, California, certainly one of his longtime pals and collaborators, Jason Lives director Tommy McLoughlin, instructed The Hollywood Reporter and Entertainment Weekly.
McLoughlin shared stills of the late actor’s Jason Lives position in his Instagram tribute to Rydbeck. Within the sixth Friday the thirteenth installment, launched in 1986, Rydbeck gave a comedic and memorable flip as Roy, who comes throughout the titular villain, Jason Voorhees, within the woods throughout a paintball recreation earlier than assembly a grisly finish.
Alongside pictures of the nerdy, bespectacled character Roy, McLoughlin wrote, “We misplaced not solely a very humorous comic and actor…however one of the crucial good hearted human beings I’ve ever identified.”
In a press release supplied to horror outlet Bloody Disgusting, McLoughlin mentioned that Rydbeck is “actually the kindest, heartfelt and lovable individual I’ve identified,” and that his efficiency as Roy “remains to be making audiences and followers snort virtually 40 years later.”
Rydbeck appeared on-screen for the very first time in a 1970 episode of Nanny and the Professor, based on his IMDb web page.
All through the last decade, he went on to star in Love at First Chew, Rocky II, Steven Spielberg’s 1941, in addition to an episode of M*A*S*H. A few of his later one-off episode appearances embody Residing Single, Celebration of 5 and Scrubs.
Invoice O’Leary/The Washington Submit through Getty
Maybe his most memorable position of all was his stint as one-half of the dummy duo Vince and Larry within the U.S. Division of Transportation’s iconic “You can be taught loads from a dummy” crash check commercials, which debuted within the Nineteen Eighties.
Alongside the opposite half of the crash dummy workforce, Tony Reitano, Rydbeck was the unique star of the slapstick public service bulletins. He and Reitano supplied the our bodies for the dummies, whereas different actors — due to the constricting masks — supplied the voices.
Reflecting on the enduring position in 2010, when among the dummies’ physique elements and costumes have been donated to the Smithsonian’s Nationwide Museum of American Historical past, Rydbeck instructed The Washington Post that he was a fantastic match for the position, largely due to his background as a mime.
He and McLoughlin have been each members of the Richmond Shepard Mime Troupe and the McLoughlin-founded L.A. Mime Firm within the Seventies, based on THR. McLoughlin instructed the outlet that the late actor “was the proper man for that” due to his aptitude for “bodily comedy.”
Elsewhere in his interview with The Washington Submit, Rydbeck recalled how tough it was to get out and in of the PSA dummy getups. “God forbid you needed to go to the toilet,” he joked.
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Regardless of the simple humor of the commercials, Rydbeck mentioned he took the decision to motion — to all the time buckle up — to coronary heart. “I all the time buckle up, I will let you know that,” he instructed the outlet. He additionally joked that he used to fret his newspaper obituary would at some point learn: “Actor Who Performed Crash Dummy Died for Not Buckling Up.”
Earlier than retiring, Rydbeck put his expertise as a mime, comedy actor and crash dummy to make use of later in life by instructing drama at Pasadena Metropolis School, based on his social media.
