David McCallum, who played Russian agent Illya Kuryakin opposite Robert Vaughn’s Napoleon Solo in the hit 1960s series “UNCLE Agent” and had a supporting role as pathologist Donald “Ducky” Mallard in the series “NCIS: Naval Criminology” decades later, he died yesterday in New York at the age of 90.
McCallum was born in Glasgow, Scotland, the son of a father who was first violinist with the London Philharmonic and a cellist mother. At first he devoted himself to music, learning to play the oboe and studying for a time at the Royal Academy of Music, although he soon left it and enrolled at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.
Before playing the agent who would make him famous, he appeared in the British film about the Second World War “Seven Against the Jungle” (1961) alongside Richard Harris, Richard Todd and Laurence Harvey, and the following year in “Billy Budd”, by Peter Ustinov, and “Freud”, by John Huston.
Source: Ambito
I am an author and journalist who has worked in the entertainment industry for over a decade. I currently work as a news editor at a major news website, and my focus is on covering the latest trends in entertainment. I also write occasional pieces for other outlets, and have authored two books about the entertainment industry.
