Actor Gale Gordon Dies At 89

Gale Gordon, a character actor known for his comic fussiness and his sitcom roles opposite Lucille Ball, died of cancer Friday at the Redwood Terrace Health Center. He was 89.

Gordon was praised by critics for “his nifty slow-burn turns” and for being “always amusing in a state of high dudgeon.”

Gordon played Lucille Ball’s masculine foil on television as the onscreen successor to Desi Arnaz after the couple divorced in 1960. From 1962 to 1968, Gordon was a principal performer on “The Lucy Show,” weekly on CBS, playing Mr. Mooney, a pompous bank executive, opposite Ball’s businesswoman and mother of grown children.

From 1968 to 1974, Gordon was her blustery boss and brother-in-law on the successor sitcom “Here’s Lucy.” And in 1986 he performed with Ball in the ABC series “Life With Lucy.”

His other television work included a co-starring role in “The Brothers” from 1956 to 1958 and featured roles in series “My Favorite Husband” and “Our Miss Brooks” in the 1950s and “Dennis the Menace” in the 1960s.

Early in the 1950s, he had regular parts in seven weekly radio programs, including “Our Miss Brooks,” “The Alice Faye-Phil Harris Show,” “The Dennis Day Show” and the long-running “Fibber McGee and Molly.” In that show he played Mayor LaTrivia.