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Don Knotts: ''There's a little Barney in me, I'm sure.''
Knotts revealed where the character came from in a conversation with Conan O'Brien.
Oftentimes, it's not enough that our favorite actors play their iconic characters onscreen. We want them to be that character! It's so fun when an actor, mid-interview, retorts with the same wit we've grown to love on TV. Or, better yet, what if Adam West could stop crime? Especially when characters embody some noble, upstanding sense of justice or forthrightness, we want those actors to present the same qualities! What a letdown it would be to learn that William Shatner didn't actually uphold the Federation's Prime Directive.
So, it does a heart good to learn when an actor feels a kinship to their most famous role.
In the case of Don Knotts, who famously played Barney Fife on The Andy Griffith Show, the truth came out in a 1999 interview on Late Night with Conan O'Brien. Conan asked Knotts whether he had any of his character in him.
At first, the actor was self-effacing, and Knotts said, "I hope not."
However, he quickly course-corrected, saying "Well, there's a little Barney in me, I'm sure."
O'Brien furthered the line of questioning and asked Knotts whether Barney was based on anybody that the actor knew in real life.
"No, I really didn't. In the beginning, the writers, you know, wrote the character, and we embellished it as we went along— developed it, over the weeks," said Knotts.
Conan O'Brien was clearly someone who looked up to Knotts a great deal, telling him, "You're someone who made being nervous funnier than any other performer I've ever seen. Did you know any nervous people when you were coming along?"
Knotts replied, "Actually, that came from, uh, I saw a guy at a luncheon giving a speech, and he was that nervous! I mean, he was spilling water all over himself. And then I dreamed a monologue about a nervous guy. And I got up and wrote the rest of the monologue and did it on The Tonight Show."
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In later years, while studying my genealogy, I discovered Don Knotts is a cousin from my mother’s side of the family. I feel honored!!
