John Larkin (radio and television actor)
| John Larkin | |
|---|---|
| Born |
April 11, 1912 Oakland, California, USA |
| Died | January 29, 1965 (aged 52) Studio City, California, USA |
| Cause of death | heart attack |
| Resting place | Chapel Of The Pines Crematory |
| Years active | 1954-1965 |
| Spouse(s) | Genelle Gibbs Teri Keane (1950-1961) (divorced) (1 child) Audrey Blum (1961-1965) (his death) (2 children) |
| Children | Victoria Larkin, John Larkin Jr. Sharon Larkin Cathleen Larkin |
John Larkin (April 11, 1912 – January 29, 1965) was an American actor whose nearly 30-year career was capped by his 1950s portrayal of two fictional criminal attorneys — Perry Mason on radio and Mike Karr on television daytime drama The Edge of Night. After having acted in an estimated 7,500 dramatic shows on radio, he devoted his final decade to television and, from April 1962 to January 1965, was a key member of the supporting cast in two prime-time series and made at least twenty major guest-starring appearances in many of the top drama series of the period.
A native of the San Francisco Bay city of Oakland, Larkin developed a distinctively resonant voice perfectly suited to radio, the prime entertainment venue in American homes of the Depression 1930s. By the latter part of the decade, when he was in his mid-twenties, Larkin had worked for a number of stations, including KCKN and WHB in the Kansas City Metropolitan Area, where he was an announcer and, later, in Chicago, where he became known for his versatility in performing announcing and hosting duties in addition to acting in front of the microphone for numerous scripted shows, including Vic and Sade, one of network radio's most popular programs of the 1930s, and the one for which he received his first major credit as a radio actor.
Larkin played Frankie McGinnis in the radio soap opera Girl Alone, a role that included some singing. An item in Movie Radio Guide noted, "when the script calls for Frankie to sing, John Larkin does his own singing."
Following military service in World War II, he established himself in the capital city of network radio, New York and, having become one of the medium's top dramatic voices, was offered, in 1947, the title role in CBS Radio Network's three-and-a-half-year-old afternoon crime serial, Perry Mason which, as was the case with all radio daytime dramas, consisted of an 11-minute script, broadcast Monday through Friday in a 15-minute time slot, including commercials, promos and credits.
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