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Joe Don Baker Dies: ‘Walking Tall’ Star Who Appeared In Three James Bond Films Was 89
The actor Joe Don Baker rose to fame playing a vigilante sheriff in 1973's 'Walking Tall.'
He then moved to Los Angeles and launched a TV and film career that included guest appearances on such series as Honey West, Gunsmoke, The Big Valley, Mission: Impossible, Lancer and The Streets of San Francisco, among many others. Critics may have scoffed, but the movie, directed by Phil Karlson, was a hit with audiences caught up in the early ’70s vigilante film craze that included Death Wish, Dirty Harry and even Taxi Driver. Standing at 6’2″ and with the broad frame of the linebacker he was in college, Baker had a prolific screen career playing tough guys on both sides of the law throughout the 1970s and ’80s in such movies as Charley Varrick(1973), Mitchell(1975) and Speedtrap(1977).
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