James Best
Known for: Acting
Born: July 26, 1926
Died: April 6, 2015
Place of birth: Powderly, Kentucky, USA
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia James Best (born Jewel Franklin Guy; July 26, 1926 – April 6, 2015) was an American television, film, character, voice, and stage actor, as well as a writer, director, acting coach, artist, college professor, and musician, whose career spanned seven decades of television. He appeared as a guest on various country music and talk shows. One of the busiest actors in Hollywood, who began his contract career with Universal Studios in 1949, where he met unfamiliar actors Julie Adams, Piper Laurie, Tony Curtis and Rock Hudson. Best's long career began in films in 1950. He appeared primarily in Westerns, playing opposite Audie Murphy in Kansas Raiders (1950), The Cimarron Kid (1952) and The Quick Gun (1964), Raymond Massey in Seven Angry Men (1955), George Montgomery in Last of the Badman (1957), Frank Lovejoy in Cole Younger Gunfighter (1958), and Randolph Scott in Ride Lonesome (1959). He also starred in the science fiction cult movie, The Killer Shrews (1959) and its sequel, Return of the Killer Shrews (2012). He is most known for playing bumbling Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane in the action/comedy Dukes of Hazzard, a role that he revised in The Dukes of Hazzard: Reunion! (1997) as his character was now "boss" of Hazzard County as well as sheriff, and again in The Dukes of Hazzard: Hazzard in Hollywood (2000).
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Filmography
74 movies · 80 TV shows, newest first
4.7
Hollywood in the Atomic Age: Monsters! Martians! Mad Scientists!
2021
7.7
Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia
2013
5.8
The Sweeter Side of Life
2013
5.2
Return of the Killer Shrews
2012
6.0
Moondance Alexander
2007
4.9
Hot Tamale
2006
7.0
CMT: Inside Fame
2005
5.8
The Men Who Made the Movies: Samuel Fuller
2002
6.0
The Dukes of Hazzard: Hazzard in Hollywood
2000
5.4
The Dukes of Hazzard: Reunion!
1997
8.1
E! True Hollywood Story
1996
5.6
Death Mask
1995
6.1
B.L. Stryker
1989
7.5
In the Heat of the Night
1988
4.5
The Dukes
1983
7.2
Enos
1980
7.4
The Dukes of Hazzard
1979
7.7
Centennial
1978
6.3
Hooper
1978
5.6
The End
1978
6.8
Rolling Thunder
1977
5.5
The Savage Bees
1977
6.1
Nickelodeon
1976
5.2
Gator
1976
6.2
Ode to Billy Joe
1976
NR
The Runaway Barge
1975
6.5
Savages
1974
7.0
The Manhunter
1974
7.8
Hawkins
1973
7.5
Sounder
1972
3.0
The Brain Machine
1972
5.4
Run, Simon, Run
1970
5.6
Lancer
1968
6.1
The Mod Squad
1968
6.2
Firecreek
1968
6.5
The Guns of Will Sonnett
1967
7.9
First to Fight
1967
6.5
Felony Squad
1966
7.4
The Green Hornet
1966
8.0
Hawk
1966
5.4
Three on a Couch
1966
7.2
Honey West
1965
6.9
Shenandoah
1965
6.3
Black Spurs
1965
7.0
Daniel Boone
1964
6.2
Flipper
1964
6.4
The Quick Gun
1964
7.0
Shock Corridor
1963
6.3
Redigo
1963
6.3
Burke's Law
1963
6.0
Temple Houston
1963
7.3
The Fugitive
1963
8.0
The Gallant Men
1962
7.9
Combat!
1962
NR
General Electric True
1962
7.9
The Alfred Hitchcock Hour
1962
6.5
The Virginian
1962
4.5
Black Gold
1962
5.9
Ben Casey
1961
5.8
Whispering Smith
1961
6.3
Surfside 6
1960
6.7
Stagecoach West
1960
7.6
The Andy Griffith Show
1960
6.5
Michael Shayne
1960
6.4
The Barbara Stanwyck Show
1960
6.6
The Mountain Road
19608.0
Aftermath
19607.7
Pony Express
1960
6.3
Overland Trail
1960
5.6
Hawaiian Eye
1959
6.8
Startime
1959
5.1
The Rebel
1959
8.5
The Twilight Zone
1959
7.4
Men Into Space
1959
6.4
Lock-Up
1959
6.8
The DuPont Show with June Allyson
1959
6.7
Laramie
1959
9.0
The Man and the Challenge
1959
7.5
Bonanza
1959
6.6
Cast a Long Shadow
1959
4.5
The Killer Shrews
1959
8.0
The David Niven Show
1959
6.6
Verboten!
1959
6.7
Ride Lonesome
1959
6.2
Black Saddle
1959
7.2
Rawhide
1959
7.2
77 Sunset Strip
1958
6.4
Bat Masterson
1958
8.0
Behind Closed Doors
1958
7.1
The Rifleman
1958
6.0
The Texan
1958
6.0
Bronco
1958
7.0
Wanted: Dead or Alive
1958
5.7
The Naked and the Dead
1958
6.0
The Left Handed Gun
1958
6.6
Cole Younger, Gunfighter
1958
3.5
Man on the Prowl
1957
6.9
Tombstone Territory
1957
6.9
Trackdown
1957
7.7
Perry Mason
1957
7.3
Have Gun, Will Travel
1957
6.8
Richard Diamond, Private Detective
1957
6.8
Last of the Badmen
1957
5.7
Hot Summer Night
1957
6.6
The Rack
1956
7.5
West Point
1956
6.1
Calling Homicide
1956
7.3
Gaby
1956
7.3
Forbidden Planet
1956
5.9
Come Next Spring
1956
7.8
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
1955
7.5
Frontier
1955
6.2
Cheyenne
1955
6.7
Gunsmoke
1955
6.5
Top of the World
1955
6.0
Seven Angry Men
1955
6.0
Buffalo Bill Jr.
1955
5.8
The Millionaire
1955
6.5
They Rode West
1954
3.8
Climax!
1954
7.0
The Lineup
1954
6.5
The Raid
1954
6.0
Return from the Sea
1954
7.2
The Caine Mutiny
1954
6.6
The Yellow Tomahawk
1954
7.2
Stories of the Century
1954
5.9
Riders to the Stars
19549.0
Skip Taylor
1953
6.2
City of Bad Men
1953
6.2
Column South
1953
5.6
Seminole
1953
6.8
General Electric Theater
1953
4.6
Flat Top
1952
4.6
Cavalcade of America
1952
5.3
Hopalong Cassidy
1952
6.6
Ma and Pa Kettle at the Fair
1952
5.7
Francis Goes to West Point
1952
6.6
The Battle at Apache Pass
1952
7.0
Steel Town
1952
6.1
The Cimarron Kid
1952
8.8
Hallmark Hall of Fame
1951
7.2
Schlitz Playhouse of Stars
1951
6.0
The Adventures of Kit Carson
1951
6.3
Apache Drums
1951
5.7
Air Cadet
1951
7.0
Target Unknown
1951
6.0
Kansas Raiders
19506.7
Lux Video Theatre
1950
4.7
The Gene Autry Show
1950
7.3
Winchester '73
1950
6.0
Peggy
1950
5.8
I Was a Shoplifter
1950
5.0
Comanche Territory
1950
5.3
One Way Street
1950