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Camp Snoopy Premieres June 14 on Apple TV+; Remembering Elizabeth MacRae of Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.

Attention campers! Apple TV+ unveiled the trailer for the all-new, highly anticipated summer Peanuts series Camp Snoopy, premiering on Friday, June 14.

After discovering their troop is in danger of disbanding, Snoopy and the Beagle Scouts set off to immerse themselves in nature and the Great Outdoors to earn their badges, with the Beagle Scout Manual as their guide. Meanwhile, Charlie Brown and friends enjoy their summer at Camp Spring Lake, crossing paths with Snoopy as they experience hiking, swimming, sitting around campfires and everything summer camp and the outdoors have to offer.

Produced for Apple TV+ by Peanuts and WildBrain, the new series is based on the Peanuts comic strip by Charles M. Schulz and is directed by Rob Boutilier (The Snoopy Show, Snoopy in Space). Executive producers are Craig Schulz, Paige Braddock, Boutilier, Josh Scherba, Stephanie Betts and Logan McPherson.

Actress Elizabeth MacRae, who had a recurring role as Lou-Ann Poovie on Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C., has died. She died on May 27 in Fayetteville, North Carolina. Ms. MacRae was 88.

MacRae had a recurring role as Lou-Ann Poovie in 15 episodes of the CBS sitcom Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C. from 1966 to 1969. Lou-Ann Poovie is Gomer's (Jim Nabors) girlfriend. She debuts in the third season episode "Love's Old Sweet Song" as a singer for a nightclub, but leaves the job at Gomer's urging to return home to Turtle Creek, North Carolina, and marry her beau Monroe Efford. She was hired to play a very lousy singer for just one episode, cast because she was indeed a bad singer, and because of her true bred southern accent. The characters – and MacRae and Nabors – got along so well onscreen, they decided to make her more or less his permanent girlfriend.

Some of her sitcom guest appearances included Harrigan and Son, I Dream of Jeannie, The Andy Griffith Show and Rhoda.

She was cast multiple times on the long-running Gunsmoke, appearing once in the role of Fanny in the 1962 episode "Half-Straight" and then, between 1962 and 1965, appearing four times as April, the girlfriend of Festus Haggen (Ken Curtis), one of the series' main characters.

Some of her other television guest appearances included Naked City, Maverick, The Asphalt Jungle, Surfside 6 (3 episodes), 77 Sunset Strip, Dr. Kildare, The Untouchables, Sam Benedict, Stoney Burke, Death Valley Days, Burke's Law, Route 66 (4 episodes), Rawhide, The Fugitive, The Virginian, Bonanza, Judd for the Defense, Mannix, Petrocelli, Kojak (2 episodes) and Barnaby Jones.

MacRae's soap opera credits included General Hospital, Another World, Days of Our Lives, Guiding Light and Search for Tomorrow.

She starred as Meredith in Francis Ford Coppola's The Conversation (1974). Her other film credits included Love in a Goldfish Bowl (1961), Everything's Ducky (1961), The Wild Westerners (1962), Wild Is My Love (1963), For Love or Money (1963), The Incredible Mr. Lumpet (1964) (as the voice of Ladyfish) and Alien Zone (1978). Her final credit was as a news reporter in Eddie and the Cruisers II: Eddie Lives! (1989).

Ms. MacRae was funny and memorable as Lou-Ann Poovie. She performed in dozens of television series and in nine feature films over her career that spanned 25 years. We thank her for her work on Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C. and other series. She will be deeply missed.

Film and television producer Albert S. Ruddy, who co-created Hogan's Heroes, has died. He died after a brief illness at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles on May 25. Mr. Ruddy was 94.

Ruddy and Bernard Fein created the 1965-1971 CBS sitcom Hogan's Heroes. The series is set in a prisoner-of-war (POW) camp in Nazi Germany during World War II, which concerns a group of Allied prisoners who use the POW camp as an operations base for sabotage and espionage purposes directed against Nazi Germany. It was a critical and commercial success and ran for six seasons and 168 episodes.

In 1976, he produced a western made-for-TV movie called The Macahans, which was subsequently developed into the 1976-1979 ABC western series How the West Was Won. Ruddy, Leslie Greif, Paul Haggis and Christopher Canaan created the 1993-2001 CBS action crime series Walker, Texas Ranger. He was the executive producer for three episodes in 1993. He was also credited on the 2021-2024 The CW prequel series Walker.

He produced The Godfather (1972) and Million Dollar Baby (2004), both of which won him the Academy Award for Best Picture. In the 2022 Paramount+ biographical drama miniseries The Offer, which dramatizes the making of The Godfather and is executive produced by Ruddy, he is played by Miles Teller.

Mr. Ruddy was developing a Hogan's Heroes sequel series in 2019. It will be interesting to see if it ever happens. We thank him for creating the classic Hogan's Heroes. He will be greatly missed.

We also remember actor, screenwriter, television executive, and acting coach Darryl Hickman. He appeared on The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, The Nanny and other sitcoms. He died on May 22 in Montecito, California. Mr. Hickman was 92.

Hickman played Davey Gillis in three episodes of the first season (1959-1960) of the CBS sitcom The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis. Davey Gillis is Dobie's (Dwayne Hickman) older brother, a college student no more responsible and no less girl-crazy than Dobie. Davey was written out of the series after season one and Dobie is regarded as an only child thereafter.

Some of his other sitcom guest appearances included Love, American Style (1970), Maude and All in the Family. He appeared as various characters in four episodes of The Nanny from 1997 to 1999.

Hickman starred as Ben Canfield on the short-lived 1961 NBC Civil War drama The Americans. Some of his other television guest appearances included The Lone Ranger (2 episodes), The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp, Perry Mason, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Wanted: Dead or Alive, Gunsmoke (2 episodes), Rawhide (2 episodes), The Untouchables (2 episodes), Dr. Kildare and Baywatch. He wrote three episodes of The Loretta Young Show in 1961 and an episode of Hawaiian Eye in 1961.

Some of his voice credits included Space Stars, Pac-Man, The Biskitts, Pole Position, A Pup Named Scooby-Doo and The Greatest Adventure: Stories from the Bible.

He appeared in films such as The Grapes of Wrath (1940), Leave Her to Heaven (1945) and Fighting Father Dunne (1948).

Mr. Hickman started his career as a child actor in the Golden Age of Hollywood and appeared in numerous television series as an adult. He was the older brother of Dwayne Hickman who died in 2022. We thank him for work on television and in films. He will be sorely missed.

Posted by Todd -- SitcomsOnline.com at 12:30 PM

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Labels: Apple TV+, Gomer Pyle USMC, Hogan's Heroes, Obits, Peanuts