Joe Don Baker

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Joe Don Baker (born February 12, 1936 in Groesbeck, Texas) is an American film actor perhaps best known for his role as sheriff "Buford Pusser" in the American film classic Walking Tall. Baker got his start in acting as an uncredited character in the 1967 film Cool Hand Luke, but his real beginnings came when he scored the role of Steve McQueen's younger brother in the film Junior Bonner. He later starred as the main character in the 1973 film Walking Tall, a film that was remade in 2004 starring The Rock. Baker was offered a cameo in the remake and declined the offer.

Joe Don Baker appeared in a couple of films that were eventually lampooned on the Mystery Science Theater 3000 television series: Mitchell and Final Justice.

Baker appeared on television in 1980 in the short lived police drama series Eischeid where he played Chief Earl Eischeid. In 1985 he portrayed the corrupt key villain Chief Jerry Karlin in the Chevy Chase hit Fletch.

While actor Carroll O'Connor was undergoing heart bypass surgery, Baker took his place on the television series In the Heat of the Night. Baker appeared as Captain Tom Duggan, a retired police captain who filled in while O'Connor's character was away at a police convention.

Although he appeared in "B" movies such as "Final Justice" and "Mitchell" It is generally agreed, that, his work in films such as "Walking Tall", "Junior Bonner", "Charley Varrick", "Edge of Darkness" and "Cape Fear" are seminal works in a career spanning four decades.

[edit] James Bond series

In 1987, Baker got the role of the villain Brad Whitaker in the Bond film The Living Daylights, starring Timothy Dalton as James Bond. In 1995 and 1997 Baker returned to the series, this time playing a different character, the slovenly and dim-witted CIA agent Jack Wade, in GoldenEye and Tomorrow Never Dies with Pierce Brosnan as Bond. He is one of seven actors to have played two separate roles in the official James Bond cinema series, preceded by Charles Gray, Walter Gotell, Jeremy Bulloch, Maud Adams, Anthony Dawson and Robert Brown.

The character of Wade is similar to that of CIA agent Darius Jedburgh, played by Baker in the critically acclaimed 1985 BBC Television serial Edge of Darkness. He was nominated for "Best Actor" by the British Academy Television Awards. This serial was directed by Martin Campbell, who also cast Baker as Wade in GoldenEye.

Also, strangely enough Baker was said to have actually tried out for the role of James Bond once for Live and Let Die, but decided to work on other roles.