Manhattan-born thespian William Redfield, influenced early on in his acting career by his father, an orchestra conductor, and his mother, a former Ziegfeld Follies girl, made his Broadway debut in "Swing Your Lady" at the age of nine in 1936.
As a juvenile, he continued to appear on Broadway with productions such as "Our Town" in 1938 and "Junior Miss" in 1941. Within a few years, he was also heard on radio and appeared in his first movie, the crime drama "Back Door to Heaven" in 1939.
As he grew older, Redfield became one of the original founders of the famed Actor's Studio and went on to have a successful career on stage and television throughout the 1950s. He starred in a short-lived series, "Jimmy Hughes, Rookie Cop," in 1953 and followed it up with the one-season show "The Marriage" in 1954, which was the first live network series to be regularly broadcast in color.
Redfield was an exceptionally talented writer and speaker, and he co-created the sitcom "Mister Peepers" in the 1950s. He also wrote the theater play "A View with Alarm" and published his memoir, "Letters From an Actor," which recalled his experiences playing Guildenstern in the 1964 theater production of "Hamlet" starring Richard Burton and directed by John Gielgud.
Throughout his career, Redfield appeared in a variety of Broadway productions, including "Misalliance" in 1953, "Midgie Purvis" in 1961, and "A Man for All Seasons" in 1961. He also had roles in films such as "Morituri" in 1965, "Fantastic Voyage" in 1966, "A New Leaf" in 1971, "Such Good Friends" in 1971, "The Hot Rock" in 1972, and "For Pete's Sake" in 1974.
Redfield's breakthrough role came in 1975 when he played the tense and logical mental patient "Harding" opposite Jack Nicholson's "Randall McMurphy" in the Oscar-winning film "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." What should have been the start of an enviable film support career turned out to be nearly his swan song, as he died of leukemia the following year at the age of 49.
His son, Adam Redfield, also became an actor on stage and TV.
