Frank Dolan, 92, Longtime Actor, Film Critic
From the Boston Globe – 2017-12-16
A former theater and film critic for radio stations WEEI, WHDH, and WRKO and a nationally syndicated film critic for Associated Press radio news, Frank Dolan died of pneumonia Nov. 15 in JML Care Center in Falmouth. He was 92 and had been a longtime Boston resident…
In 1977, he and his wife, Muriel, originated the title characters on WCVB-TV’s social issues sitcom “The Baxters,” which Norman Lear subsequently bought and recast to broadcast nationally. Mr. Dolan was also a host of WBZ-TV’s “Yankee Magazine.” …
Mr. Dolan, who donated tapes of his reviews to the Harvard Theatre Collection, developed a reading program of poetry and prose later in his career for public libraries. His son established a website, www.frankfavorites.com, to promote the program and chronicle Mr. Dolan’s career…
Accompanying Mr. Dolan to a show he was reviewing had special meaning for his son Andrew. “To this day,” Andrew said, “I feel I’m missing something if I’m not close to the stage.”
A former theater and film critic for radio stations WEEI, WHDH, and WRKO and a nationally syndicated film critic for Associated Press radio news, Frank Dolan died of pneumonia Nov. 15 in JML Care Center in Falmouth. He was 92 and had been a longtime Boston resident…- Read more in the Boston Globe
From Fred Barzyk
It is always sad when someone you have known and worked with for over 50 years passes.
Frank Dolan and I first met when he was doing community theater back in 1960. I invited Frank and his wife to one of my “Learn to Act for TV” courses I did at WGBH in the early days. Since I had convinced the management to let me do dramas, I needed to find volunteer actors. Frank and his wife were some of the first to join.
Frank appeared in two Jean Shepherd dramas and in my last drama done a few years ago “The Waiting Room.” His laugh, good cheer and professionalism will be missed.
Dear Frank Dolan was one of the first actors I gathered around me way back in 1962. He was always featured when possible in my dramas.
He was in Phantom of the Open Hearth, ran the local movie house, Between Time and Timbuktu, Vonnegut’s take off on the suicide parlor, and leader of the high school band in The Great American 4th of July and other disasters. All these can be found in the Fred Barzyk Archive at fredbarzyk.com. I also worked with his wife and this son. Wonderful wonderful memories
As a child model, aged ten, I worked with Mr. Dolan for a Boston Gas TV commercial, recorded on May 3, 1966. The next month I asked my mother to write to him to inquire about acting lessons. Unfortunately, there is no further reference to the matter in my mother‘s notes, and I have no memory of even making the spot.