Riddle me this, Batman: Who was that giggly masked man in green tights, the one with a big question mark on his chest?
That’s no riddle to Pittsburghers of a certain age, who would recognize Frank Gorshin anywhere.
The late actor who would become the Riddler on the “Batman” TV series paid his dues in Pittsburgh before his spot-on impersonations of Hollywood heavyweights such as Edward G. Robinson and Kirk Douglas were seen regularly on late night TV talkers. He appeared in movies and on Broadway, too, but it was as the Riddler that he is perhaps best remembered. You can see his likeness today in the new digital interactive comic book “Batman ’66: The Riddler’s Ruse #1,” available at comixology.com.
Born in 1934, Gorshin attended Arsenal Elementary in Lawrenceville and Peabody High School before a short stint at Carnegie Mellon (then Tech). He appeared in local night clubs and plays before joining the Armed Forces in 1953 and, while entertaining the troops, he met a Universal Studios rep who found him a role in the film, “The Proud and the Profane.”
According to the official Frank Gorshin website, the actor was visiting his parents in Pittsburgh in 1957 when his agent called and told him to rush back to Hollywood and screen test for the movie “Run Silent, Run Deep.” The website recounts, “After driving 39 straight hours Frank fell asleep at the wheel and crashed the car. He suffered a fractured skull and did not wake up until four days later in a hospital.” Don Rickles won the role, and Gorshin later discovered that Los Angeles newspapers had reported he died in the car accident.
Other movie roles and TV appearances followed, including 12 guest appearances on “The Ed Sullivan Show.” A new generation of fans discovered his talent for creating characters on Jan. 12, 1966, when he appeared in the pilot of “Batman,” which was titled “Hi Diddle Riddle.” Gorshin earned an Emmy nomination for laughing it up as the Riddler, which included nine more appearances and a movie. Gorshin also received an Emmy nod for his guest-starring role on the “Star Trek” episode “Let That Be Your Last Battlefield,” in which he played an alien from a planet where people battled each other based on whether they were black on the right side of their bodies and white on the left, or the reverse — a commentary on race relations of the day.
In 1970, Gorshin made his Broadway debut in play “Jimmy,” based on the life of New York Mayor James J. Walker, and in 2002-03, he starred in Rupert Holmes’ one-man show about George Burns, “Say Goodnight Gracie.” The latter earned Gorshin a Drama Desk nomination and he toured in the show, including a stop at the Byham Theater in 2004. Post-Gazette senior theater critic Christopher Rawson wrote, “Here, in Gorshin’s hometown, it is impossible not to find in this story something of Gorshin’s life, too, enjoying, like Burns at a later age, an Indian summer of revived stardom.”
Mr. Gorshin died on May 17, 2005, after battling lung cancer and emphysema. His grave site is in Hazelwood’s Calvary Catholic Cemetery.
Related post — “Riddle me this Batman: Where can we find the 1960 TV series transformed into a digital comic book?”