Andrew Duncan obit

Andrew Duncan, original Second City actor, dies

‘The quintessential straight man’ appeared in the Chicago theater’s first revue and later in the movies ‘Love Story’ and “Slapshot.’

 

He was not on the list.

Andrew Duncan, a pioneering Second City actor who was in the Chicago company’s first revue in 1959, has died, the theater announced Monday.

His age and cause of death were not revealed.

After his work in “Excelsior & Other Outcries,” in an ensemble that included Barbara Harris and Severn Darden, Duncan went on to perform in several other Second City shows (including one on Broadway) and have a busy career in TV and the movies in the 1960s and ’70s.

Before the launch of Second City, Duncan was part of the Chicago precursor companies Compass Players and Playwrights Theatre Club, appearing onstage with such future stars as Mike Nichols, Elaine May, Shelley Berman and Harvey Korman.

“Andrew Duncan was the quintessential straight man and interviewer at both The Compass and Second City,” colleague Sheldon Patinkin wrote in his book “The Second City: Backstage at the World’s Greatest Comedy Theater.”

He put his straight-man skills to work in one of Second City’s most revered scenes, “Football Comes to the University of Chicago,” playing an amiable coach trying to make gridiron stars out of a group of pointy-headed academics at the Hyde Park campus.

Duncan’s film credits included the hits “Love Story” (1970), “Slapshot” (1977) and “An Unmarried Woman” (1978).

 

Filmography

 

Cast (Feature Film)

The Luckiest Man in the World (1989)

Morgan Stewart's Coming Home (1987)

General Fenton

The Gig (1985)

F.D.R. -- The Last Year (1980)

Robert Nixon

The Line (1980)

Breaking Glass (1980)

Performer

Attica (1980)

Lieutenant John Driscoll

Used Cars (1980)

The Day the Women Got Even (1980)

Firepower (1979)

A Little Romance (1979)

Last Embrace (1979)

An Unmarried Woman (1978)

Slap Shot (1977)

La Honte de la jungle (1975)

Voice

The Silence (1975)

The Crazy World of Julius Vrooder (1974)

Foreplay (1974)

Hurdlemeyer

I Could Never Have Sex With Any Man Who Has So Little Regard For My Husband (1973)

Stanley

Parades (1972)

Chaplain

The Hospital (1971)

William Mead

Love Story (1970)

Reverend Blauvelt

Loving (1970)

Willy

The Rain People (1969)

Artie

The Virgin President (1968)

Secretary of Defense William Salvo

Cast (Special)

As Caesar Sees It (1962)

Regular