John Ritter^†

Growing up as Tex Ritter's son gave him a showbiz address but not an automatic career. He spent his early TV years playing a gentle reverend on The Waltons before landing Jack Tripper on Three's Company in 1977. The role called for fearless physical comedy: pratfalls, full-body reactions, the kind of slapstick that doesn't look like work. He delivered it well enough to win both an Emmy and a Golden Globe in 1984. Don Knotts, no slouch at the form himself, called him "the greatest physical comedian on the planet."

8 Simple Rules was supposed to be his second act, a hit ABC sitcom that debuted in fall 2002 and immediately landed in the network's top five. He died during rehearsals for the second season, age 54, before the show could fully become his. The series kept going, writing his character as dead, adding James Garner and David Spade as replacements. The more lasting second act turned out to be his death itself: his wife Amy Yasbeck founded the John Ritter Foundation for Aortic Health, and doctors established guidelines called the "Ritter Rules" in 2010 to help catch aortic dissection before it kills.

His father Tex Ritter was a singing cowboy and country music star who tried to steer him away from acting. When John finally made it to TV, it was on The Waltons, reportedly Tex's favorite show, and they became the first father-and-son pair to have side-by-side stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. There's also a weirder detail: a projectile injury as a teenager left him with only peripheral vision in his right eye, which is a strange thing to carry through a career built on physical precision. His sons Jason and Tyler both became actors.

He collapsed during 8 Simple Rules rehearsals on September 11, 2003, was rushed to Providence Saint Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, and died that night after emergency surgery for an aortic dissection initially misdiagnosed as a heart attack. His wife Amy Yasbeck filed a $67 million wrongful death lawsuit against two of his treating physicians; the court cleared both. 8 Simple Rules resumed production later that fall, with his character written as dying offscreen.