Movies

David McCallum Trivia | 70 facts about the late actor

David McCallum was a Scottish actor and musician best known for his role in NCIS.

Let’s find out some trivia and facts about the late actor.

His full name is David Keith McCallum
He was born on September 19th, 1933
He died on 25 September 2023
McCallum was a Scottish actor and musician
He gained wide recognition in the 1960s for playing secret agent Illya Kuryakin in the television series The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
The Man from U.N.C.L.E., intended as a vehicle for Robert Vaughn, made McCallum into a sex symbol
His Beatle-style blond haircut providing a trendy contrast to Vaughn’s clean-cut appearance
McCallum’s role as the mysterious Russian agent Illya Kuryakin was originally conceived as a peripheral one
McCallum, however, took the opportunity to construct a complex character whose appeal rested largely in what was shadowy and enigmatic about him
Kuryakin’s popularity with the audience as well as Vaughn and McCallum’s on-screen chemistry were quickly recognized by the producers
And McCallum was elevated to co-star status
Although the show aired at the height of the Cold War, McCallum’s Russian alter ego became a pop culture phenomenon
The actor was inundated with fan letters, and a Beatles-like frenzy followed him everywhere he went
While playing Kuryakin, McCallum received more fan mail than any other actor in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s history
Hero worship even led to a record, “Love Ya, Illya”, performed by Alma Cogan under the name Angela and the Fans, which was a pirate radio hit in Britain in 1966
A 1990s rock-rap group from Argentina named itself Illya Kuryaki and the Valderramas in honour of The Man from U.N.C.L.E. character.
McCallum received two Emmy Award nominations in the course of the show’s four-year run (1964–’68) for playing the intellectual and introverted secret agent
McCallum and Vaughn reprised their roles of Kuryakin and Solo in a 1983 TV film, Return of the Man from U.N.C.L.E.
In 1986 McCallum reunited with Vaughn again in an episode of The A-Team entitled “The Say U.N.C.L.E. Affair”
The episode was complete with “chapter titles”, the word “affair” in the title, the phrase “Open Channel D”, and similar scene transitions
His other notable television roles include Carter in Colditz (1972–1974) and Steel in Sapphire & Steel (1979–1982)
McCallum never quite repeated the popular success he had gained as Kuryakin until NCIS
Beginning in 2003, McCallum gained renewed international popularity for his role as NCIS medical examiner Dr. Donald “Ducky” Mallard in the American television series NCIS
In Season 2 Episode 13 “The Meat Puzzle”, NCIS Special Agent Caitlin Todd (Sasha Alexander) asks Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs (Mark Harmon), “What did Ducky look like when he was younger?” and Gibbs replies, “Illya Kuryakin”
According to the behind-the-scenes feature on the 2006 DVD of NCIS season 1, McCallum became an expert in forensics to play Mallard, including attending medical examiner conventions
In the feature, Donald P. Bellisario says that McCallum’s knowledge became so vast that at the time of the interview he was considering making him a technical adviser on the show
McCallum appeared at the 21st Annual James Earl Ash Lecture, held 19 May 2005 at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, an evening for honouring America’s service members
His lecture, “Reel to Real Forensics”, with Cmdr. Craig T. Mallak, U.S. Armed Forces medical examiner, featured a presentation comparing the real-life work of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner staff with that of the fictional naval investigators appearing on NCIS
In late April 2012, it was announced that McCallum had reached an agreement on a two-year contract extension with CBS-TV
The move meant that he would remain an NCIS regular past his eightieth birthday
In May 2014 he signed another two-year contract
He signed an extension in 2016
Beginning a limited schedule in 2017
And since then renewed his contract for each season separately
With series lead Mark Harmon’s departure from the show in the fall of 2021 (Season 19), McCallum became the last remaining member of the original NCIS cast until his death in 2023
On film, McCallum notably appeared in The Great Escape (1963)
In the 1960s, McCallum recorded four albums for Capitol Records with music producer David Axelrod
These albums were Music…A Part of Me (Capitol ST 2432, 1966), Music…A Bit More of Me (Capitol ST 2498, 1966), Music…It’s Happening Now! (Capitol ST 2651, 1967), and McCallum (Capitol ST 2748, 1968)
The best known of his pieces today is “The Edge”, which was sampled by Dr. Dre as the intro and riff to the track “The Next Episode”
McCallum’s version of “The Edge” appears on the soundtracks to the 2008 video game Grand Theft Auto IV and the 2017 film Baby Driver
McCallum did not sing on these records, as many television stars of the 1960s did when offered recording contracts
As a classically trained musician, he conceived a blend of oboe, cor anglais and strings with guitar and drums, and presented instrumental interpretations of hits of the day
The official arranger on the albums was H.B. Barnum
However, McCallum conducted, and contributed several original compositions of his own, over the course of four LPs
The first two, Music…A Part of Me and Music…A Bit More of Me, have been issued together on CD on the Zonophone label
On Open Channel D, McCallum did sing on the first four tracks, “Communication”, “House on Breckenridge Lane”, “In the Garden, Under the Tree” (the theme song from the film Three Bites of the Apple) and “My Carousel”
The music tracks are the same as the Zonophone CD. This CD was released on the Rev-Ola label
The single release of “Communication” reached No. 32 in the UK Singles Chart in April 1966
In The Man from U.N.C.L.E. episode “The Discotheque Affair”, McCallum plays the double bass as part of a band in a night club
He also played guitar and sang his own composition, “Trouble”, with Nancy Sinatra on “The Take Me to Your Leader Affair”
He played several instruments in “The Off-Broadway Affair”.
In the 1970s, McCallum also recorded three H. P. Lovecraft tales for Caedmon Records, an imprint of August Derleth’s Arkham House publishing venture
These were titled “The Rats in the Walls” (TC 1347, 1973); “The Dunwich Horror” (“slightly abridged”; TC 1467, 1976); and “The Haunter of the Dark” (TC 1617, 1979)
In 2016, McCallum published a crime novel entitled Once a Crooked Man
The narrative is set in New York and London and centres on a young actor who tries to foil a murder
McCallum stated that a second novel was in progress
On 11 May 1957, McCallum married actress Jill Ireland in London
The couple met during the production of the film Hell Drivers
The marriage lasted ten years. After leaving McCallum, Ireland married Charles Bronson, to whom McCallum had introduced her while McCallum and Bronson were filming The Great Escape (1963)
McCallum and Ireland had three sons: Paul, Jason, and Valentine (Val)
Jason, who was adopted, died from an accidental drug overdose in 1989
Val McCallum is a guitar player, playing on and off with Jackson Browne since 2002, Lucinda Williams from 2011 to 2016, and many others
He was a member of the faux country band Jackshit
In 1967, McCallum married Katherine Carpenter
They had a son, Peter, and a daughter, Sophie
McCallum and his wife were active in charitable organisations that support the United States Marine Corps
Katherine’s father was a Marine who served in the Battle of Iwo Jima and her brother was killed in the Vietnam War
On 27 August 1999, McCallum was naturalized as a United States citizen
McCallum had six grandchildren. He was friends with Tibor Rubin
McCallum died at the NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital in New York City on 25 September 2023, a week after his 90th birthday