What was the cause of death for Bonanza star Pernell Roberts?”
Like many in my generation, I was an avid fan of the TV show Bonanza, launched in 1959. It was destined to become the second most popular TV western after Gunsmoke. In particular, I was mesmerized by the show’s eldest brother, the suave, deep-voiced, dark-haired Adam Cartwright, played by Pernell Roberts, who died Sunday at 81 of pancreatic cancer. I remember how shocking and irrational it seemed when Roberts decided to leave Bonanza a few years later at the height of its popularity. No one had ever done that before. Some erroneously said he would never work again. (He would go on to guest star in over 60 television series and starred in the hit TV show Trapper John, M.D. that ran for seven years.) In late 1966, I foolishly flew out to Hollywood to try my hand as an actor, screenwriter, and songwriter. I took acting classes and somehow managed to land an agent. I decided the best way to learn the business was to watch screen and TV actors plying their trade. So I would sneak into Unive
Pernell Roberts, the outspoken actor who played Adam Cartwright, the thoughtful eldest son on television’s seminal western series “Bonanza” and who was the last surviving member of the show’s original family, died Sunday at his home in Malibu, Calif. He was 81. Skip to next paragraph Blog ArtsBeat ArtsBeat The latest on the arts, coverage of live events, critical reviews, multimedia extravaganzas and much more. Join the discussion. * More Arts News Enlarge This Image CBS Playing “Trapper John, M.D.” The cause was pancreatic cancer, said his lawyer and friend Richard A. Stone. Dark-haired, handsome and athletically built, Mr. Roberts was a rising theater actor — a busy Shakespearean, in fact — who had performed in a number of classic plays Off Broadway and on before he landed, in 1959, on the Ponderosa, the ranch that provided the setting for “Bonanza.” Adam, the first-born son of Ben Cartwright (Lorne Greene), a three-time widower who had had a son with each of his wives, was the book-
