Larry Hagman was born September 21, 1931, as Larry Martin Hagman, who became one of the most recognizable and popular television actors of the 1980s and early 1990s. His role of J.R. Ewing on the show Dallas earned him recognition worldwide as it has now been broadcast in over 90 countries.
Larry Hagman was born in Fort Worth, Texas, to Mary Martin and his father was Benjamin Jack Hagman, who was a district attorney. When his parents divorced, Larry Hagman at age five went to live with his grandmother, in both Texas and California. His mother had become a famous actress by this time and began to bring her son to her movies. His mother married Richard Halliday and from that union Hagman’s sister Heller was conceived.
Influenced by his mother, Hagman began his acting career in Dallas, Texas, as a production assistant and began acting in small roles in Margo Jones during the 1950s.
His two most notable acting accomplishments of the time were that he appeared in The Taming of the Shrew in New York City and also in 1951 he worked with his mother in the London production of South Pacific for one year.
He joined the Air Force but his love of acting brought him back to New York after leaving the military, where he appeared in the Off-Broadway play Once Around the Block, which was a William Sarovan project and Hagman earned great reviews for his part. His next project was yet another Off-Broadway play entitled James Lee’s Career.
Hagman switched to television but struggled for years to find a starring role yet made numerous guest appearances on many popular TV programs. His first major television role came in 1965 as he won the role of Major Anthony Nelson in the iconic series I Dream of Jeanie where he starred opposite the beautiful Barbara Eden. The show became a top ten hit its first year and was NBC’s answer in the ratings war with BeWitched and My Favorite Martian.
It was Hagman’s wife who later suggested he read the role of J.R. Ewing on Dallas. Hagman was cast as conniving older son and businessman who everybody loved to hate. Dallas originally had been written around Patrick Duffy and Victoria Principals characters but with the emergence of J.R. Ewing’s popularity by the third season the full focus of the show turned to Hagman’s character. When media frenzy around “Who Shot JR?” took off it made Hagman arguably the most popular actor in America for that period of time.
The television show Dallas ran for 13 seasons making it one of the longest running and most successful shows in television history. At the end of its 13th season Dallas had 357 episodes and Hagman is the only actor who appeared in all of them.
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