George Mitchell

[PennyDreadful]

Looking at that pic on the main page of Vicki and Matthew reminds me of how creepy George Mitchell was in that role.  Why did he leave the show?  I mean, in a way, I'm glad he did because we got Thayer David who added a more obsessive, mentally disturbed aspect to the role.  However, I thought Mitchell was pretty good too.  It's too bad he didn't return as another character later on.  Ahyuh.

Penny Dreadful 

[Joeytrom]

I liked George Mitchell too, but they probably felt they needed a more menacing looking actor to play the role for Vicky's kidnapping later on, so they got Thayer David.

Dan Curtis never used an original actor of a charcater that got recast in a second role.  Once they were fired, that was it for them.

[Luciaphile]

He had a stage career. It's entirely possible he got a play and took off to do that. He also did a lot of episodic TV, so he may have left for a more lucrative gig.

Personally I always thought he was a lot more creepy than Thayer David. Thayer David played Matthew like a guy you'd see and cross the street to avoid. George Mitchell played him like a guy who seemed sort of normal until you got to talking to him. And then when you wanted to cross the street it was too late.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

He had a stage career. It's entirely possible he got a play and took off to do that. He also did a lot of episodic TV, so he may have left for a more lucrative gig.

That's been my assumption too. Matthew isn't one of the characters listed in the Shadows on the Walls bible, so more than likely he wasn't a contract character, which would have left George Mitchell open to accept a better job if one came along.

Personally I always thought he was a lot more creepy than Thayer David. Thayer David played Matthew like a guy you'd see and cross the street to avoid. George Mitchell played him like a guy who seemed sort of normal until you got to talking to him. And then when you wanted to cross the street it was too late.

Exactly! If anything, I think Mitchell's Matthew would have been more menacing once Matthew goes over the edge. Thayer David brought a sympathy to Matthew that may not have been there had Mitchell continued to play him.

[onyx_treasure]

     I live in Maine and see little old men that look like George Mitchell all the time.  They usually wear well-worn flannel shirts with thermal undershirts(winter or summer) with ill fitting work pants(the kind you buy at a farm store) and suspenders.  They are not married(either never married or widowers for so long they forgot what living with other humans is like).
    I went into a local membership store.  A George Mitchell look-alike walked in behind me.  He yelled out "HOW DO I GET GAS?".  A cheerfull, young girl said "Are you a member, sir."  "No" he barked.  She told him he would have to go to the counter and apply for membership.  He looked at her and yelled " HOW DO I GET GAS".  I walked away at that point.  He wanted what he wanted when he wanted it.  They are stubborn and anti-social.  I think George Mitchell was perfectly cast and played the role realistically.

[D_Friedlander]

The role I remembered him best for (before I got to see the old opisodes of DS) was "Jackson" in the film "Andromeda Strain", where he played one of two very different survivors of a mysterious illness.  It was a good, paranoid, cynical  sci-fi thriller of the times (1971.).  Mitchell was funny as heck--- his character survived the epidemic because his body chemistry was messed up by drinking Sterno, which he called "squeeze."  (I don't know if this was good science or not, but Michael Crichton, who wrote it, was a doctor at the time, so perhaps it was a plausible premise.)

According to IMDB, that was Mitchell's last named role (a major one in this film--- the last role seems to have been a bit part) and if he didn't steal the movie, it wasn't for lack of trying.   I remember everyone in the movie theater chuckling whenever he said "squeeze."   Sadly, he died shortly afterward in January 1972, just a couple of weeks before his 67th birthday.  IMDB doesn't mention the cause.. He looked older than his years in AS, even given that his character was supposed to be in poor health to begin with. So he may have been sick in real life by then.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

The role I remembered him best for (before I got to see the old opisodes of DS) was "Jackson" in the film "Andromeda Strain", where he played one of two very different survivors of a mysterious illness.

Whoa, that's taking me way back - The Andromeda Strain was one of my favorite movies from back in the early '70s. Who knows how many times I've watched it on TV, however, I've never realized that Jackson was played by our George Mitchell. But then, the first time I ever saw Mitchell in a DS ep wasn't until '95 and I haven't seen TAS in at least 20 years, so I probably wouldn't have put it together.

He looked older than his years in AS

I checked my copy of John Willis' Screen World for the '71 film releases, but unfortunately Mitchell doesn't appear in any of the photos from TAS.    I wonder if it's available on DVD...

[Mysterious Benefactor]

I wonder if it's available on DVD...

Apparently it is - it came out in April of 2003. And here's a review that mentions Mitchell's performance quite favorably: DVD Savant Review: The Andromeda Strain

I'll definitely have to add this DVD to my list...

[onyx_treasure]

     I remember him in Andromeda Strain.  I thought he looked like he was 80.  Its hard to believe he was only 67.  In the movie, he kept flirting with the nurse.  He had irascible old coot down pat.

[Philippe Cordier]

It's good to remember George Mitchell's performance as Matthew.  I didn't know the actor's name so I was curious to read this thread and find out who he was.

I remember thinking he was pretty unnerving in the role, too.

Onyx Treasure, your descriptions of this type of character in real life are great.

I barely remember "The Andromeda Strain."  Interesting to consider that the director, Robert Wise, also directed "The Haunting" (not one of my favorites, but I'll have to give it a second go one of these days) and "The Sound of Music." 

[michael c]

i did think that george mitchell seemed more like a "real" person as matthew morgan than thayer david did.
i thought thayer brought a more over-the-top,almost cartoonish quality to matthew as well as the other characters i've seen him play on the show.

this might be totally off-topic but for me when matthew held victoria captive at the old house i found it to be much more intensly disturbing than some later storylines when her captor was some sort of supernatural being,which again had a more "cartoonish" quality,than the thought of a real but genuinely disturbed man holdiing a young woman captive...and as i recall threatening to behead her.

[Miss_Winthrop]

David Thayer's Matthew's character was really creepy and disturbing when he held Victoria captive.  I think David Thayer was ultimately the best choice to play Matthew.  However, George Mitchell was really good too and I thought he was a little bit more believable as the fierce defender of the Collins family than Thayer David was. I can picture Mitchell's character as a Collins Cannery employee and someone Liz would have picked out to be come a handyman up at Collinwood.