Bob Newhart’s passing on July 18, 2024, is the loss of one of the greatest comic minds of the 20th and into the 21st century. His career started in the late 1950s and spanned to 2020. He worked as a comedian and actor for eight decades, which is indicative of his talent, likeability and work ethic. Throughout his career, he led two sitcoms, The Bob Newhart Show and Newhart, the first for six seasons with 142 episodes and the second for eight seasons with 184 episodes. Both were hits with the critics and ratings. Newhart acted in many famous films, more recently in the popular comedy Elf with Will Ferrell and played a recurring character known as Professor Proton in the huge hit The Big Bang Theory for six seasons. Films of note for Newhart are Hell Is for Heroes, Catch-22, The Rescuers, The Rescuers Down Under, Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde and Horrible Bosses.
He grew up in Oak Park, Illinois, and was educated through the parochial schools in the area. Newhart served in the U.S. Army during the Korean War as a clerk based stateside. He attended Loyola University of Chicago and started work as an accountant for United States Gypsum. He did not last long and found his calling in show business while working as an advertising copywriter for an indie film and TV producer. Newhart got his break doing recorded absurdist humor telephone calls with a coworker which caught the ear of a disc jockey named Dan Sorkin. Sorkin introduced him to Warner Bros. Records and he was signed to a contract that expanded his material to a stand-up routine used in nightclubs. Newhart was off to the races and was invited on to the famous The Ed Sullivan Show in 1960, which introduced him to an even broader national audience.
Through this early period, Newhart released multiple records including The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart, Behind the Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart, The Button-Down Mind on TV, The Best of Bob Newhart and many more. He won two Grammys and topped the Billboard and UK Albums Charts with his records. He also got his first crack at TV with The Bob Newhart Show in 1961, which was a variety show and unfortunately only lasted one season. Throughout his career, he appeared on many high-level talk shows such as The Tonight Show Starring Johhny Carson, Saturday Night Live, The Judy Garland Show and The Dean Martin Show. His dry comedy and wit left audiences in stitches and many times the hosts of the shows.
In the early 1970s, Newhart collaborated with one of the biggest stars at the time, Mary Tyler Moore and her production company run by her and her husband, TV producer Grant Tinker to make a sitcom. This collaboration turned out to be The Bob Newhart Show which put Bob as the starring character who worked with a psychologist-starred talent actress Suzanne Pleshettte and a cast of many more memorable characters. The show competed against popular offerings of the day, including M*A*S*H, Sanford and Son and The Waltons. The show held its own and found an audience for Newhart’s special brand of midwestern and dry humor while covering many hot topics for the 70s.
The show ended in 1978 and the world moved in the 1980s. Newhart desired to do another sitcom and spoke with CBS about the idea. This led to the sitcom Newhart beginning in 1982 and running to 1990. The setup involved Newhart being an innkeeper in Vermont and working as a TV talk show host. The show involved many hijinks and humor set against the backdrop of the rural Vermont countryside. Local townie characters provided the drama and comedy with a down-home touch to their performances. The strange characters of the local town drive Newhart’s character bonkers through most episodes. It has a very special final episode that has lived on in parody on other shows such as Saturday Night Live, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Breaking Bad and The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Check out Newhart’s two top sitcom hits and see what the popular ending of Newhart is all about.
Through the 1990s, Newhart’s career cruised as he appeared on The Simpsons (as himself), It’s Garry Shandling’s Show, Murphy Brown, in another couple of sitcoms that were short-lived, Bob, and George & Leo. Into the 2000s he picked up roles in ER, Mad TV, Committed and the mega smash hit Desperate Housewives. The 2010s were very kind to the hard-working Newhart with parts on NCIS, Five, Hot in Cleveland, The Librarians, Young Sheldon and the fantastic The Big Bang Theory. He found a new audience through both The Big Bang Theory and Young Sheldon playing the Arthur Jeffries/Professor Proton character with undertones to Obi Won Kenobi from Star Wars.
Newhart also tried his hand at radio stations and becoming a home computer aficionado, which both were successful. He leaves behind a legacy of laughter and touching people’s hearts. Many stars paid tribute to him including Reese Witherspoon, Jamie Lee Curtis, Kaley Cuoco, Conan O’Brien, Mayim Bialik and Mark Hamil. Newhart passed on July 18, 2024 at the age of 94.