Ben Piazza (July 30, 1933 â€" September 7, 1991) was an American
actor.Piazza made his film debut in Sidney J. Furie's Canadian film A
Dangerous Age (1959) followed by his Hollywood debut in The Hanging
Tree (1959). Though he signed contracts with Warner Bros. and Gary
Cooper's production companies for five years, he did not make another
film until No Exit (1962).A prolific television and film character
actor, Piazza is perhaps most widely recognized as the wealthy
restaurant patron in John Landis' 1980 comedy hit The Blues Brothers
from whom Jake (John Belushi) offers to purchase his wife and
daughter. Prior to that, he also played the violent boyfriend who
scars Liza Minnelli's character's face in Otto Preminger's Tell Me
That You Love Me, Junie Moon (1970). Piazza's other film appearances
include The Candy Snatchers (1973); Piazza played a dramatic role in
an episode ofBarnaby Jones, titled “Bond of Fear†(04/15/1975),The
Bad News Bears (1976), I Never Promised You a Rose Garden (1977),
Nightwing (1979), Peter Bogdanovich's Mask (1985), Clean and Sober
(1988), and Guilty by Suspicion (1991), in which he portrayed
Hollywood film director/mogul Darryl F. Zanuck. In 1986, Piazza had a
three-month stint on the daytime soap opera Santa Barbara as Dr. A.L.
Rawlings.Piazza also wrote plays and a novel, The Exact and Very
Strange Truth (1964), a coming-of-age story about an Italian-American
boy in Little Rock, Arkansas, which was Piazza’s hometown. However,
Ben wrote in the book’s introduction that any resemblance between
the characters and real people was “irrelevant†, although the
parallels to his own life were unmistakable. Piazza dedicated the book
to openly gay playwright Edward Albee, who was a close friend.
actor.Piazza made his film debut in Sidney J. Furie's Canadian film A
Dangerous Age (1959) followed by his Hollywood debut in The Hanging
Tree (1959). Though he signed contracts with Warner Bros. and Gary
Cooper's production companies for five years, he did not make another
film until No Exit (1962).A prolific television and film character
actor, Piazza is perhaps most widely recognized as the wealthy
restaurant patron in John Landis' 1980 comedy hit The Blues Brothers
from whom Jake (John Belushi) offers to purchase his wife and
daughter. Prior to that, he also played the violent boyfriend who
scars Liza Minnelli's character's face in Otto Preminger's Tell Me
That You Love Me, Junie Moon (1970). Piazza's other film appearances
include The Candy Snatchers (1973); Piazza played a dramatic role in
an episode ofBarnaby Jones, titled “Bond of Fear†(04/15/1975),The
Bad News Bears (1976), I Never Promised You a Rose Garden (1977),
Nightwing (1979), Peter Bogdanovich's Mask (1985), Clean and Sober
(1988), and Guilty by Suspicion (1991), in which he portrayed
Hollywood film director/mogul Darryl F. Zanuck. In 1986, Piazza had a
three-month stint on the daytime soap opera Santa Barbara as Dr. A.L.
Rawlings.Piazza also wrote plays and a novel, The Exact and Very
Strange Truth (1964), a coming-of-age story about an Italian-American
boy in Little Rock, Arkansas, which was Piazza’s hometown. However,
Ben wrote in the book’s introduction that any resemblance between
the characters and real people was “irrelevant†, although the
parallels to his own life were unmistakable. Piazza dedicated the book
to openly gay playwright Edward Albee, who was a close friend.
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