HAYDEN RORKE

October 23, 1910

Hayden Rorke was born as William Henry Rorke in Brooklyn, New York. Hayden was his mother’s maiden name. He was best known for playing Colonel Alfred E. Bellows on the 1960s  sitcom “I Dream of Jeannie.” He studied drama in high school and attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. He began his stage career in the 1930s. 

During World War II, he enlisted in the United States Army, where he made his film debut in the musical This Is the Army starring Ronald Reagan playing a soldier uncredited. 

Following the war, he left the Army and did small parts on Broadway and regional theatre, including Dream Girl starring Lucille Ball in 1947. This was Rorke’s first encounter with Ball, but not his last. He returned to Hollywood for the film Lust for Gold (1949), again uncredited. He finally got his first screen credit later that year in Rope of Sand starring Burt Lancaster.  His best known films were When World’s Collide (1951) and All That Heaven Allows (1955). 

Rorke made his TV debut on “I Love Lucy” in “The New Neighbors” (ILL S1;E21) in early 1952. 

Rorke and K.T. Stevens played the O’Briens, new tenants at 623 East 68th Street. They are actors rehearsing a scene, which Lucy overhears and mistakes them for spies plotting to blow up the capitol!  

In 1971, after 129 episodes of “Jeannie”, Rorke was seen as a Judge on “Here’s Lucy” in “Lucy and the Raffle” (HL S3;E19). 

Lucy and Kim are hauled in front of a Judge to explain why they are running a raffle without a permit. 

In November 1965, Rorke played A.J. Considine on “The Taylors In Hollywood,” an episode of “The Andy Griffith Show,” a series shot on the Desilu lot. Considine is the director of a movie based on Andy Taylor’s life titled “Sheriff Without a Gun”. The episode also featured “Lucy” players Herb Vigran, Ross Elliott, and Sid Melton. 

On the sitcom “I Dream of Jeannie” Rorke played the incredulous Dr. Alfred Bellows from 1965 to 1970, even returning for a “Jeannie” reunion special in 1985, his last screen project. He died in 1987. At the time of his passing, he had done nearly 150 films and television shows.

In 2011, Rorke’s “Jeannie” costar Barbara Eden gave an interview to TV Guide  in which she revealed that Rorke was gay and had a longtime romantic partner  director Justus Addiss (above). The two met on the film Project Moonbase in 1953. Addiss directed Rorke in four episodes of “The Schlitz Playhouse” (all in 1955) and one episode of “Goodyear Summer Originals” in 1956.