David Hedison ’51

David Hedison ’51, of Beverly Hills, Calif.; July 18. A theater, television, and screen actor who was best known as a submarine captain on Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. In the early 1950s he appeared in the plays Much Ado About Nothing and A Month in the Country, which won him a Theatre World Award for most promising newcomer. Signed by Twentieth Century-Fox, he appeared in The Enemy Below (1957), Son of Robin Hood (1958), and The Fly. He was the first actor to portray CIA operative Felix Leiter in two non-consecutive James Bond films; Live and Let Die and Licence to Kill. He later had recurring roles on daytime dramas Another World and The Young and the Restless. He appeared in seven episodes of The Love Boat and six episodes of Fantasy Island. His last movie role was in Confessions of a Teenage Jesus Jerk (2017). Over the course of a six-and-a-half-decade career he appeared in more than 100 films and television roles but said theater was his first love. In the 1990s and early 2000s he appeared in regional theater, often in Massachusetts and Maine. He is survived by two daughters.