A show-stopping comic for decades, the inimitable Arnold Stang, with the trademark Runyonesque voice and thick, black glasses, started out famously on radio before branching out to include Broadway, films and especially TV. Born on September 28, 1918, in New York City to wife JoAnn Taggart, a writer, Stang died of pneumonia at age 91 in Newton, Massachusetts, just before Christmas in 2009. He was also survived by his two children, David Donald and Deborah Jane.
Got his start in radio as "Jughead" on the "Archie Andrews" Show, replacing Hal Stone who was in the Army during the Korean War. Arnold appeared simultaneously on "Archie Andrews" and TVs "Texaco Star Theatre Starring Milton Berle" .
Cast member on ABC (later NBC) Radios "The Henry Morgan Show" (1946-1950).
Was cast in a 1980 Sony radio commercial which won a CLIO award for best commercial of the year in its category.
In the late 1950s and early 1960s he was spokesman for the Chunky Candy Bar and made many Television commercials for that candy bar. His proclamation of "Chunky, what a Chunk o Chocolate!" was the finish of each commercial and was as well known as any tag-line of its era.
Stang invented and mischievously perpetuated a story that he was born and raised in the Boston suburb of Chelsea. But his wife said he was really raised in Brooklyn. He lived in the Boston suburb of Needham for the past decade, according to the Hollywood Reporter December 22, 2009.
Father of David Stang.
[Remarking on his preference for radio over TV]: Radio allows you to use,your imagination. TV dinners describe what TV really is.
