You know the voice: a deep, rumbling foghorn. But do you know this face? The man whose heart and soul belonged to the stage? The comedian, the actor, the husband, the father?
Joseph Silver was born on September 22, 1922 in Chicago IL and attended the University of Wisconsin, majoring in communications and theater. There, he realized his passion: acting, and was in his first play, Tobacco Road at age twenty. Sometime between attending school and moving to New York City to pursue a Broadway stage career, Joe met and fell in love with tiny fellow struggling stage performer, Chevi Colton, who was primarily an understudy to some of the more bigger actresses. Although they were from different religious faiths (Joe was very Jewish and Chevi was Christian) it never mattered, and they were married in 1950. Early in the marriage, about 1953, Chevi gave birth to their first of two children, Chirstopher and six years later, they had their last child, Jennifer. They never raised their kids under either religion, but Christopher would later become interested and convert to Judaism as a grown man. The couple even worked side by side in 1956 in a play called O, Marry Me!, a musical, but they did not play lovers--Joe and Chevi actually played father and daughter because he looked and sounded much older than her with his gray hair and deep voice, even though they were the same age.
In 1949, at age 27, Joe got his first big break in television when he was part of the supporting cast of CBS pioneering educational kid's show, Mr. I. Magination with Paul Tripp. On June 19, 1955, Joe became the 2nd and final host of a New York City based show, Space Funnies. In October of the same year, the show changed its name to Captain Jett. Silver did all his own puppetry and visual effects; (a boiling pot of oatmeal served as the surface of Venus). As Captain Jett, he amused his "Space Hoppers" live and in their living rooms for five more years until the show was pulled in December of 1960. In spite of this, Joe was very versitile and continued doing work in commercials, Broadway, and off-Broadway, and had regular appearances on the Red Buttons show.
Things really didn't take off for Joe until the early and mid 1970's when he was very active in all branches of show business with TV's Fay (1975), movie, You Light Up My Life (with good friend and fellow Broadway star, Didi Conn of Grease fame) and then, his magnum opus, the 1972-73 Broadway production of Lenny, in which he played 4 to 9 different roles. He earned a Tony nomination for Supporting Player but did not win.
The hallmark of his movie and made for TV movie career seemed to be as the supporting player for new, struggling actors, like Dom Deluise in 1964's Diary of A Bachloer and Richard Dreyfuss in the Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz. He won praise from movie critics for playing Dreyfuss' father. In 1982's Deathtrap, Joe once again was a supporter of a well-known actor, Michael Caine, in a brief, but memorable cameo as his long suffering off-broadway agent, and, once more, a very Jewish role. He was the embodiment of the "Jewish Patriarch" and often gave fatherly advice to his friends in real life.
In the 1980's, things were still going very strongly for Joe but he became very sick in the latter part of the decade, but refused to slow down even so, especially on the stages of New York. In fact the final show of Leggs Diamond, which closed on Feb. 19, 1989, in which he played a cigar smoking crime lord, was just 8 days shy of what proved to be his dying day, when he passed away from liver cancer. He was only 66 years old, but died doing what he truly loved. His ashes were scattered down his beloved Broadway, where he worked for 46 years.
For Joseph Silver
September 22, 1922-February 27, 1989
Character actor, puppeteer, comedian, husband, friend and father to many,
How we miss you!
May you always shine on!
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