Red Buttons

Although Red Buttons is best known as a stand-up comic, he is also a successful songwriter, an Academy Award-winning actor (and has been nominated for two Golden Globe awards) and an accomplished singer. Born Aaron Chwatt on February 5, 1919 (Aquarius) in New York City's Lower East Side, stood at a height of 5' 6" (1.68 m). Buttons (who got his name from a uniform he wore while working as a singing bellhop), also known as Cpl. Red Buttons, started his show-business career singing on street corners as a child. At 16 he got a job as part of a comedy act playing the famed Catskills resort area in upstate New York (his partner was future actor Robert Alda). Buttons worked the burlesque circuit as a comic and even landed a role in a Broadway play, "Vicki", in 1942. He soon joined the U.S. Marine Corps, and in 1943 was picked for a role in Moss Hart's service play "Winged Victory" on Broadway, and soon afterwards journeyed to Hollywood to make the film version. After his discharge from the service he returned to Broadway, both in plays and as a comic with several big-band orchestras. He was successful enough that he got his own TV series, The Red Buttons Show (1952), on CBS. It lasted three years and won Buttons an Emmy for Best Comedian. He worked steadily for the next several years, and in 1957 got his big film break in the drama Sayonara (1957) with Marlon Brando, in which he played an American soldier stationed in Japan who struggled against the societal and racist pressures of both American and Japanese cultures because of his love for a Japanese woman. His performance garnered him an Academy Award, and more film roles followed. He played a paratrooper in The Longest Day (1962), was nominated for a Golden Globe for Harlow (1965) and again for They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969). He had a part in the TV series The Double Life of Henry Phyfe (1966) and has done pretty much every kind of TV show there is, from variety to comedy to soap operas. He gained further renown in the 1970s for his appearances on the "Dean Martin Celebrity Roast" where he performed his "Never Got a Dinner" act to great acclaim. He has played Las Vegas for years, has a star on Hollywood Boulevard (corner of Hollywood and Vine) and has appeared in numerous telethons and charitable events, for which he has been honored by such organizations as the Friars Club and the City of Hope Hospital. He died July 13, 2006 at the age of 87 in Century City, California, USA from vascular disease.

Known For: Acting

Born: New York City, New York, USA, 1919-02-05

Died: 2006-07-13

No.	Year	Title	Role	Vote Average
1	1944	Winged Victory	Whitey / Andrews Sister	55
2	1951	Footlight Varieties	Himself	10
3	1957	Sayonara	Joe Kelly	66
4	1958	Hansel and Gretel	Hansel	0
5	1958	Imitation General	Cpl. Chan Derby	57
6	1959	A Marriage of Strangers	Jerry	0
7	1959	The Big Circus	Randy Sherman	65
8	1961	One, Two, Three	MP Sergeant (uncredited)	75
9	1962	Hatari!	Pockets	67
10	1962	Five Weeks in a Balloon	Donald O'Shay	54
11	1962	The Longest Day	Pvt. John Steele	76
12	1962	Gay Purr-ee	Robespierre (voice)	66
13	1963	A Ticklish Affair	Flight Officer Simon 'Uncle Cy' Shelley	57
14	1964	Your Cheatin' Heart	Shorty Younger	63
15	1965	Up from the Beach	PFC Harry Devine	80
16	1965	Harlow	Arthur Landau	54
17	1966	Stagecoach	Peacock	61
18	1966	Murder at N.B.C.		0
19	1969	They Shoot Horses, Don't They?	Sailor	76
20	1970	George M!	Sam Harris	100
21	1970	Breakout	Pipes	0
22	1971	Who Killed Mary Whats'ername?	Mickey Isadore	46
23	1972	The Poseidon Adventure	James Martin	71
24	1976	Louis Armstrong - Chicago Style		0
25	1976	Gable and Lombard	Ivan Cooper	52
26	1976	Joys	Self	40
27	1977	Viva Knievel!	Ben Andrews	36
28	1977	Pete's Dragon	Hoagy	63
29	1977	Telethon	Marty Rand	50
30	1978	The Users	Warren Ambrose	10
31	1978	Movie Movie	Peanuts / Jinks Murphy	58
32	1979	The Muppets Go Hollywood	Self	63
33	1979	Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July	Milton (voice)	64
34	1979	C.H.O.M.P.S.	Bracken	50
35	1980	Power	Solly Weiss	20
36	1980	When Time Ran Out...	Francis Fendly	53
37	1981	Leave 'Em Laughing	Roland Green	80
38	1981	Side Show	Harry Hubbell	70
39	1982	Off Your Rocker	Seymour Saltz	0
40	1983	George Burns Celebrates 80 Years in Show Business	Self	80
41	1985	Night of 100 Stars II	Self	80
42	1985	Reunion at Fairborough	Jiggs Quealy	48
43	1988	18 Again!	Charlie	56
44	1988	Jackie Gleason: The Great One	Self	80
45	1990	The Ambulance	Elias Zacharai	59
46	1994	It Could Happen to You	Walter Zakuto	67
47	1995	Darryl F. Zanuck: 20th Century Filmmaker	Self	40
48	1997	Twentieth Century Fox: The First 50 Years	Self	72
49	1999	The Story of Us	Arnie Jordan	61
50	2004	Goodnight, We Love You	Self	65

No.	Year	Title	Role	Vote Average
1	1948	The Ed Sullivan Show	Self	68
2	1948	Studio One	St. Emergency	50
3	1949	Suspense		49
4	1950	What's My Line?	Self	69
5	1952	The Red Buttons Show	Host	0
6	1953	General Electric Theater	Lieutenant George Poole	63
7	1953	General Electric Theater	Tippy-Top	63
8	1953	The Oscars	Self	71
9	1953	The United States Steel Hour		62
10	1956	The Dinah Shore Chevy Show	Self	60
11	1957	Tonight Starring Jack Paar	Self	70
12	1958	Kraft Music Hall	Self	47
13	1959	Startime		60
14	1961	Password		73
15	1961	Ben Casey		56
16	1961	Frontier Circus		47
17	1961	The Mike Douglas Show	Self - Host	54
18	1961	The Mike Douglas Show	Self - Co-Host	54
19	1962	Saints and Sinners	Joe Roganyan	60
20	1962	The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson	Self	75
21	1962	The Eleventh Hour		60
22	1963	The Greatest Show on Earth		50
23	1963	Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre		57
24	1964	The Hollywood Palace	Self - Comedian	45
25	1964	The Hollywood Palace	Self - Singer / Sketch Actor	45
26	1965	The Dean Martin Show		73
27	1966	The Double Life of Henry Phyfe	Henry Wadsworth Phyfe	55
28	1966	The Jackie Gleason Show		82
29	1967	The Danny Thomas Hour		50
30	1969	Love, American Style	Norman	61
31	1971	Great Performances	Self	53
32	1973	The Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts	Self	54
33	1974	Little House on the Prairie		79
34	1975	Wonder Woman	Ashley Norman	70
35	1977	The Love Boat	Cyrus Foster	63
36	1977	The Love Boat	Buddy Redmond	63
37	1978	Vega$		70
38	1979	Knots Landing	Al Baker	69
39	1980	Pink Lady	Red Buttons	50
40	1980	Pink Lady	Police Sergeant	50
41	1980	The Dream Merchants	Bruce Benson	45
42	1981	Aloha Paradise		50
43	1984	The Cosby Show	Jake Bennett	70
44	1985	227		68
45	1985	Alice in Wonderland	White Rabbit	69
46	1986	It's Garry Shandling's Show	Red Buttons	72
47	1988	Roseanne		68
48	1994	ER	Ruby	78
49	1996	Cosby		59
50	1996	Early Edition	Walter Stites	73
51	1999	Family Law	Carl Porter	82
52	2001	Philly		70
53	2002	Street Time	Sam Kahan	25
54	2002	Presidio Med	Chick	80

Red Buttons

Film

Television