Before Bewitched, York had worked steadily in film, radio and television, but it was this role that turned him into a household name. His chemistry with Elizabeth Montgomery, who played the ever-patient and always-magical Samantha, helped anchor a show full of fantasy and absurd situations.
Then there was actress Agnes Moorehead as the disapproving Endora, whose dislike for Darrin only made York’s expressions more memorable. Each episode leaned into the chaos of trying to hide Samantha’s powers, while York’s Darrin scrambled to keep up.
The job, though, wasn’t easy. York had suffered a back injury on a movie set years before, and by the later seasons of Bewitched, the pain was getting harder to manage. During filming, scenes were often adjusted to allow him to work while lying down or leaning against set pieces.
Even so, he kept the show moving, often delivering scenes with a physical comedy style that matched the series’ magical tone. His final season in 1968-69 marked the end of what many fans consider the classic years of the show.
After York’s departure, actor Dick Sargent took over the role of Darrin. But for those who watched in the earlier years, Dick York’s version of the character left a lasting impression. He played Darrin with a sense of controlled chaos that made every spell gone wrong feel personal. His work helped define the show’s golden era, making it one of the top-rated sitcoms of its time.
- James, Adam-Michael (Author)
- English (Publication Language)
- 630 Pages - 10/28/2014 (Publication Date) - Bright Horse Publishing (Publisher)
The popular actor was born Richard Allen York in Fort Wayne, Indiana, on September 4, 1928, and died on February 20, 1992, at age 63.
Below, we’ve reprinted article and photos from the years when Dick York starred on Bewitched, from 1964 through 1969, which capture moments from the set, scenes from episodes and glimpses of the characters that made the show a classic. Take a look back at this memorable era in television history.
Dick York himself on his acting career (1968)
By Dick York for The Blade (Toledo, Ohio) July 26, 1968
Being an actor is a job — like plumbing, painting a house, selling real estate. The big difference is that the actor has to learn to separate the real him from the role he’s playing.
This is especially important for someone in a long-running play or television series, I try hard to keep Dick York separated from Darrin Stephens, the mortal husband of that beguiling witch, Samantha (Elizabeth Montgomery) in ABC-TV’s “Bewitched.”
I love my work. That’s very important if you’re going to make people on the other end of the tube believe that part you’re playing. But if the actor falls into the trap of really believing what is happening on the screen, he’s got troubles.
Take the actor who demands that his wife get him a bottle of beer and a sandwich on arriving home. He also probably drops his shirt on the floor and leaves it there. He’s become too used to star treatment on the set where people run at his command and pick up after him. I’ve seen this sort of thing actually break up a marriage. The actor has to leave that self at the studio.
I’m lucky that my wife, Joan, understands these things — and more… The pretty girls and attractive matrons who hover around wanting autographs, who send gifts, who believe that you’re the hero of a story, not a man who goes home at night to a wife and family. Joey was an actress until the first of our five children was born, so she knows about this dual life of an actor.
I’m lucky to be part of “Bewitched” and work with a warm and wonderful person like Elizabeth Montgomery. She’s a magic lady off-screen as well as on, and there are not too many of them around.
Working in a congenial atmosphere is reflected in the quality of the job an actor turns in, I think. And here too we’re fortunate for there’s a genuine affection among the cast and crew. One person’s problem becomes everyone’s problem, we’ve worked together so long.
Of course, we have our rhubarbs about things like who’s going to win the world series, or which horse is going to come in first in the Derby. We even argue politics sometimes, but no one gets mad. We respect each other’s opinions. This camaraderie is felt by guest actors who always seem to enjoy working on the show.
Another thing that contributes to the quality of work the actor is able to turn in is being able to relax. After a day’s work is over I like to do something with my hands. I’ve tried painting and still dabble a little, but I find sculpting a more satisfactory relaxer, I enjoy working with Plasticine, a non-hardening clay which can be worked over and over, something like children’s modeling clay. I’m learning, working up to doing something in metal or stone one day.
Many actors, even those carrying heavy roles in TV series, take on stage plays as their “spare time” activity. This is not for me. I don’t even look around for a part during the show’s spring hiatus. I believe that 9 or 10 months of work in a year is enough, that in the end the months of freedom are a definite contribution to the sum total of your career.
Of course, it’s all in the point of view. I remember one night when I had been on Broadway in the successful play, “Tea and Sympathy” for several months, and had been making a very good living as an actor on radio, television and stage for several years, my journalism professor from Marquette University came to see the play. After the performance he came back to see me. Following the usual complimentary greeting he looked me right in the eye and said, “Now Dick, what have you written lately?” I’ve always wondered just what he meant.
Tabitha a witch? Of course, says her Hoosier ‘father’ (1966)
By Angelyn Rizzo, Journal & Courier (Lafayette, Indiana) August 17, 1966
We’ve got the inside scoop for you! Remember Tabitha, baby daughter of Samantha and Darrin on ABC-TV’s “Bewitched”? Well, she is a “witch” and will perform crinkly-nosed antics just like her mamma as she grows up.
How do we know? We got it straight from the pop — Darrin, alias Dick York.
In a telephone conversation with Dick York recently, he answered the question, “Is the baby a witch?” with “How could she be anything else?’
Of the baby, York says — “She’s gorgeous — or rather, they’re gorgeous.” Two tykes work four hour shifts and, according to York, “that’s the best of hours to have!” — even as an adult.
Unfortunately, York’s hours stretch far beyond the four-hour limit — and have for years and years.
“Bewitched” is on a tight shooting schedule and the time is divided between rehearsals and filming. “We’re limited in the number of takes for each scene because of the tight schedule we’re on,” York commented. “It’s not like making movies where you can do it over and over and over. In television, # you can’t do it right by the third try — they start looking for another actor.” On the telephone, York sounds exactly as he does on television and is just as nice to a reporter he has never met as he is to Elizabeth Montgomery, his wife in the series. We were charmed.
The working life of Dick York began when he was a boy. He was born in Fort Wayne, making him a native Hoosier, but moved to Chicago with his parents at about five. However, every summer, until he was about 14, he spent with his grandparents in Fort Wayne. He didn’t loaf those summers — he worked.
“I did everything in Fort Wayne,” he cried. He delivered papers, one even delivered leer maternal grandfather, Cliff Snyder, is a resident of North Liberty, Ind. York, as a young radio actor, thought television was years and years away. “I intended to make radio my lifetime work,” he said ‘I don’t. think anyone anticipated TV becoming so big so soon — there was all that talk about erecting huge towers every 80 many miles. I wondered if we’d ever see TV in my lifetime — then all of a sudden, it was here, and radio was dead.”
He starred in radio as Billy Fairfield on the Jack Armstrong radio show. (Remember him? The “All American Boy’ sponsored by the Breakfast of Champions.”) He was Billy for the last six years the show was on the air. “It had been on for a good 15 years when I got the part. I was 16 at the time.”
Was that show a stepping stone to his present success? “Well, I made money at it — it put me through college,” he remarked. York went to DePaul University.
He did much more radio than simply the Billy Fairfield bit. Before joining that show, he appeared en the “Judy and Jane” series in Chicago. That’s where he met his wife. “She was 12 and I was 15 — I didn’t even notice her.”
However, in New York once while doing a show he did notice this girl named Joan, “By the time I was 18, she was 15. She came in the studio to do a commercial — and I bought the product.” They were married in 1952.
The Yorks now have five children, and make their home in the hills in Hollywood, Calif.
York did three soap operas simultaneously in New York: “Rosemary,” “This Is Nora Drake” and ‘Young Doctor Malone.” “I was about 22 years old ‘at that time,” York recalls, “and I did all three shows at the same time, back-to-back, playing three different characters — a good guy in the morning, a very bad guy in the afternoon and an in-between guy on the very late show.
Joan gave up acting when the first baby arrived. York said she did some radio and TV work in New York during the first year of their marriage but “when the babies came along she just said, ‘I’m gonna be a mamma,’ and that was it.”
York appeared in an earlier series a few years ago called “Going My Way” with Gene Kelly. He says that show and “Bewitched” are completely different kinds of shows — each with a certain satisfaction to it.
“‘Going My Way’ unfortunately just didn’t make it,” York says — “it just went down the tube. The people on the show were nice — it’s too bad it didn’t go.”
Through the years, squeezed in among radio and TV work, York found time to appear in several Broadway plays, including “Tea and Sympathy” and “Bus Stop”.
His motion picture credits include “Inherit the Wind”, “Cowboy”, “They Came to Cordura”, “My Sister Eileen” and others. Working keeps York too busy to have hobbies other than his children. He devotes most of his spare time to Joan and their five — Kimberly, 8; Amanda, 7; Stacie, 6; Christopher, 3 and Matthew, 1. “We do all kinds of things together,” York said. “We paint, sculpt, play family party games, guessing games. However, he’s noticing that the two older girls are “starting to outgrow the family thing. “They seem to be beginning to prefer older boys to their old dad,” he laughed.
When we commented that he was a “natural” in the part — it never seemed as if were “acting,” York remarked — “We’re scared to death all the time.”
Vintage Bewitched episode: Season 2 – The Magic Cabin
Samantha, Darrin & Endora
Elizabeth Montgomery, Dick York and Agnes Moorehead. The trio behind the Stephens household’s daily magic and mayhem.
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