By Jason Apuzzo. • Actor Kevin McCarthy of Invasion of the Body Snatchers fame has died, at age 96. You can read about his life and career at The Washington Post and at The LA Times. McCarthy was a very fine stage and television actor, but he will certainly be best remembered for his role as Dr. Miles Bennell in Body Snatchers. His performance in that film – which modulates from warmth and good humor, to the outer edges of hysteria and terror – may actually be the iconic performance of 1950s sci-fi cinema, and is in large measure what gives that film its dramatic credibility. The ‘invasion’ works so well in that film in large measure because of how, as an actor, he sells it. He will be greatly missed, and we pass along our condolences to his family and friends.
I had the pleasure of meeting Kevin McCarthy years ago at a party hosted by the Russian dissident poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko. Oddly enough, Mr. McCarthy and I spent much of the evening in conversation together over by the punch bowl(!). He was every bit as warm, gracious and amusing in private as he appeared in public. Mr. McCarthy was quite old at the time, yet robust, and he had a boyish charm and impishness to him even in advanced age; I had the sense that if I asked him to step out on the lawn and throw a baseball around, he’d happily do it. He was quite unpretentious, and drily amused by the unexpected success of Body Snatchers.
As you can imagine, I asked Mr. McCarthy about the controversy over the years regarding the ‘meaning’ of Body Snatchers. Was it an anti-communist metaphor? Was it about anti-communist paranoia? Or just small town life? He politely demurred, and said that the intention of everybody involved with the film was chiefly to make a good thriller.
At the same time, I could not help but notice his presence at the party we were both attending – held in honor of a prominent anti-Soviet dissident. His attendance at this event quietly spoke volumes.
For those of you, by the way, who enjoyed Kevin McCarthy’s turn in Body Snatchers, make sure to check out his guest appearance on the old Invaders TV series, in the 1978 Body Snatchers remake, on Hawaii Five-O, and in Joe Dante’s original Piranha. Those are some of my personal favorites. He also gave a nice performance in Raquel Welch’s Kansas City Bomber, and does a nice (if brief) turn as Marilyn Monroe’s husband in John Huston’s The Misfits. We’ll miss him.
[UPDATE: Ironically, the Blu-ray edition of 1978’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake comes out this week, a film in which Kevin McCarthy makes a brief but memorable cameo appearance, riffing off his original character from the 1956 version of the film.]
Posted on September 13th, 2010 at 1:13pm.
Let me ask the obvious question — how did you wind up at a party hosted by Yevtushenko?
He (Yevtushenko) is the friend of a close family friend of ours who once worked in the Kremlin.