LogFAQs > #976118457

I'm surprised that the original Gomez Addams, John Astin, is still alive. He's the last surviving member of the 1964 show's cast, including his on-screen children - I just looked the show up, and the original Wednesday Addams had a stroke and died this past February.

I loved the Addams Family when I was growing up. We had cable, so I'd get to see shows like the Addams Family and Whose Line is it Anyway. John Astin was in the prime of his life in the sixties, in his mid-thirties and the model of masculinity for the time. He's still working too, it seems like he mostly does voice roles nowadays.

Out of all the cast, I'm surprised that he's the last one left. Usually you see older guys dying first; men have shorter life expectancies than women. He really set the mold for Gomez Addams, and without the groundwork he laid for the character in the tv show, we wouldn't have gotten those great Raul Julia movies in the nineties.

I'm trepidacious to bring him up after what happened with Bob Barker, but this is just one of those curious things I wanted to talk about. Apparently he's also the adoptive father of Sean Astin, who played Samwise Gamgee in the Lord of the Rings.

What a guy. I hope he's comfortable and healthy.

Edit: used the wrong name multiple times and somehow didn't catch it despite checking his Wikipedia page.