Donald Pleasence

"As far as being idolized by teens, I don't know. It must be some sort of father fixation. Or maybe they think I'm just pretty."

Donald Pleasence (1919 – 1995) was an English actor who was credited in over 200 movie and TV appearances during a career which spanned over four decades.

Often typecast as villainous and/or psychopathic characters, Pleasence is best-known for his work in two of cinema's most successful franchises - James Bond and Halloween.

Donald Pleasence has performed in the following roles:

• A Tale of Two Cities (1958), as John Barsad.
• The Great Escape (1963), as "The Forger."
• Fantastic Voyage (1966), as Dr. Michaels.
• The Hallelujah Trail (1965), as Oracle Jones.
• You Only Live Twice (1967), as Ernst Stavro Blofeld.
• THX 1138 (1971), as SEN.
• Escape to Witch Mountain (1975), as Lucas Deranian.
• The Halloween series (1978-1995), as Dr Sam Loomis.
• Puma Man (1980), as Kobras.
• Escape from New York (1981), as the president.
• Alone in The Dark 1982 (1982), as Dr. Bain.
• Phenomena (1985), as Prof. McGregor.
• Prince of Darkness (1987), as a priest.
• The Thief and the Cobbler (1993), as Phido the Vulture. (The version titled Arabian Knight replaced him with Eric Bogosian.)

Donald Pleasence provides examples of the following tropes:

• Badass Grandpa: According to the writer of Halloween 4, Pleasence did most of his own stunts in the film. He did all this while pushing 70!
• Bald of Evil
• Missing Episode: The Halloween episode of Saturday Night Live he hosted back in 1981 hasn't been seen on American TV since then, because of the musical guest's (a punk rock group named Fear) raucous performance (which included guitar smashing and mosh pits) and all the sketches containing humor that was considered dark and disgusting at the time.
• Money, Dear Boy:

"There was a sort of horror picture that I did called The Mutations. I think I did that solely for the money. I have six daughters, and they can be quite expensive, so one has to keep working and be able to pay the bills."

• Old Shame: It shouldn't be surprising Donald once declared Puma Man the worst movie he was ever part of.
• Shown Their Work: The makers went to great lengths to accurately build a German POW camp for The Great Escape. Of course, it did help that several of the actors had been prisoners of war during WW 2. Pleasence, who had been in a German POW camp, made a few suggestions to John Sturges, who wasn't aware of that fact, and was told to keep his opinions to himself. However, when the director learned that Pleasence knew what he was talking about, he was asked for advice all the time.