- Born
- Died
- Birth nameJonathan Harshman Winters III
- Nickname
- Johnny
- Height5′ 10″ (1.78 m)
- Jonathan Harshman Winters III was born on November 11, 1925 in Dayton, Ohio. His father, Jonathan Harshman Winters II, was a banker who became an alcoholic after being crushed in the Great Depression. His parents divorced in 1932. Jonathan and his mother then moved to Springfield to live with his grandmother. There his mother remarried and became a radio personality. Jonathan joined the United States Marine Corps during his senior year of high school. Upon his discharge, he entered Kenyon College and later transferred to Dayton Art Institute. He met his wife, Eileen Schauder, in 1948 and married a month later. They remain married until her death in January 11, 2009. They have a son, Jay, who is a contractor, and a daughter, Lucinda, who is a talent scout for movies.
Jonathan got his start in show business by winning a talent contest. This led to a children's television show in Dayton in 1950. This led to a game show and a talk show. Denied a requested raise, he moved the family to New York with only $56 in their pocket. Within two months, he was getting night club bookings. He suffered two nervous breakdowns, one in 1959 and another in 1961. He came out of "retirement" to work with director/writer Martin Guigui for Swing (2003) and Cattle Call (2006). He made ten Grammy-nominated comedy recordings and won once. Jonathan Winters died at age 87 of natural causes on April 11, 2013 in Montecito, California.- IMDb mini biography by: John Sacksteder <jsack@ka.net> & MO840
- SpouseEileen Winters(September 11, 1948 - January 11, 2009) (her death, 2 children)
- Children
- ParentsJonathan Harshman Winters IIAlice Kilgore RodgersRichard William Bahman
- Heavy build
- Improvised acting
- Much of the dialogue between he and close friend Robin Williams on Mork & Mindy (1978) was ad-libbed.
- Considered by many to be one of the finest improvisational comics ever.
- Suffered from bipolar disorder.
- Was voluntarily institutionalized twice in his life (and even made light of it in his stand-up comic act).
- Served in the Marines during World War II as gunner on the aircraft carrier Bon Homme Richard in the Pacific.
- If your ship doesn't come in, swim out to it.
- I don't do jokes. The characters are my jokes.
- [when someone asked him how to get into show business] You know how movie studios have a front gate? You get a Camaro with a steel grill, drive it through the gate, and once you're on the lot, you're in showbiz.
- As a kid, I always wanted to be lots of things. I was a Walter Mitty type. I wanted to be in the French Foreign Legion, a detective, a doctor, a test pilot with a scarf, a fisherman who hauled in a tremendous marlin after a 12-hour fight.
- [on painting] This year [1981] I got the idea when I was sitting in a hamburger joint and a hearse pulled up. A few minutes later a U-Haul parked behind the hearse. I want to do a picture of a horse pulling a U-hearse entitled 'You Can't Take It With You'.
- It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (1963) - $130,000
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