Bill Kennedy (actor)
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Willard "Bill" Kennedy was an American actor, voice artist, and host of the long-running Detroit based television show Bill Kennedy at the Movies. Kennedy's voice is heard doing the opening narration of the television series Adventures of Superman. Bill Kennedy
Kennedy had been a Warner Bros. contract player in the 1940s and appeared in dozens of Hollywood movies from 1941 through 1955. He was often cast as a police officer or detective. He played the character who sets fire to Joan (played by Ingrid Bergman) in Joan of Arc, and played opposite Cary Grant in Destination Tokyo.
In the Superman series, he also appeared off-screen (uncredited) as the wrestling announcer in the 1952 episode called No Holds Barred and on-screen, as one of the radio announcers (uncredited) in the 1953 episode called Crime Wave, and as the racetrack announcer in the 1955 episode called Joey. He also appears to have provided the voice on the phone for the 1954 episode called Beware the Wrecker, although Denver Pyle played the part on-screen and had a couple of spoken lines.
In 1956 Kennedy moved to the Detroit area and began his career as host of Bill Kennedy at the Movies at CKLW-TV, directly across the Detroit River in Windsor, Ontario. In 1969 he moved to WKBD and continued hosting the show until retiring to Florida in 1983. On his TV show he showed old movies, and provided anecdotes about the actors and about the production of the movies he showed derived in large part from his own Hollywood experience. He had a deadpan, sardonic style which many found refreshing, somewhat in like manner to Ed Sullivan. He did not hide his feelings about the movies he hosted, frequently saying such things as "We have a moderately good picture for you today".
Kennedy was born June 27, 1908 in Cleveland Heights, Ohio and died January 27, 1997 in Palm Beach, Florida of emphysema.
He was cremated. His ashes were given to either a friend or his family.