Oliver Burgess Meredith (November 16, 1907 – September 9, 1997), known professionally as Burgess Meredith, was an American actor, director, producer, and writer in theater, film, and television. Active for more than six decades, Meredith has been called "a virtuosic actor" and "one of the most accomplished actors of the century". A life member of The Actors Studio by invitation, he won several Emmys, was the first male actor to win the Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor twice, and was nominated for two Academy Awards.

Meredith was known later in his career for his appearances on The Twilight Zone and for portraying arch-villain the Penguin on the 1960s TV series Batman and boxing trainer Mickey Goldmill in the Rocky film series. "Although those performances renewed his popularity," observed Mel Gussow in The New York Times, "they represented only a small part of a richly varied career in which he played many of the more demanding roles in classical and contemporary theater—in plays by Shakespeare, O'Neill, Beckett and others."

Biography

In 1994, Meredith published his autobiography, So Far, So Good. In the book he confessed that he suffered from violent mood swings caused by cyclothymia, a form of bipolar disorder.

Meredith was married four times. His first wife, Helen Derby Merrien Burgess, was the daughter of the president of American Cyanamid. She took her life after their divorce. His next two wives were actresses, Margaret Perry and Paulette Goddard; Goddard suffered a miscarriage in 1944. His last marriage (to Kaja Sundsten) lasted 46 years, and produced two children, Jonathon (a musician) and Tala (a painter).

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