Not sure if this really counts, but Peter Sellers died during the planning of a movie in the Pink Panther series (to be called Romance of the Pink Panther); but the writer/director still went on to make another (different) movie (Trail of the Pink Panther) anyway, out of deleted scenes, outtakes etc from the other films.
It’s tempting to say Rebecca Schaeffer from “My Sister Sam”, who was murdered by a crazy fan, but she was killed about a year after the show was cancelled.
Dermot Morgan died very close to the end of filming of the last episode in (what turned out to be) the last series of Father Ted.
They may not technically be actors, but in 1973, Wally Cox died while doing the Hollywood Squares (Peter Marshall taped a poignant farewell that ran at the start of the subsequent show), and Dave Akeman, known as “Stringbean” on ‘Hee Haw’, was killed by burglars.
Roy Kinnear died during the filming of Dick “Don’t Call Me Dick” Lester’s Return of the Musketeers. He fell off a horse.
Nancy Marchand died between seasons of The Sopranos but the writers had included her in the plot developments of the coming season. They used some outtakes, a body double, and a good deal of rewriting to have her “die” within the season and to have her death provide a new dynamic to the show. It doesn’t take a great deal of scrutiny to see how makeshift the reshooting was, but even so it cost them a great deal to do. Gandolfini’s hair and shape were giveaways that this was after-the-fact recovery.
Najai “Nitro” Turpin died after taping The Contender (boxing reality show), but before the show aired. Does that count?
Wally Cox was definitely an actor. He starred in his own sit-com in 1952, Mr. Peepers, and later did the voice of Underdog.
Madeline Kahn died in 1999 while a regular on Cosby. I didn’t watch the show so I don’t know if any sort of replacement character was introduced.
(But she (and John Candy) have a movie coming out this year)
Wally Cox was also a good friend of Marlon Brando. I remember when he died and was shocked to find out how young he was. He must have done some hard living.
Will Lee, better known as Mr. Harold Hooper.
Well, Phil Hartman, natch, during the run of NewsRadio.
As a minor and tortured coincidence, in one episode of Futurama, Zapp Branigan (who would’ve been voiced by Hartman, had he lived) looks on while aliens vaporize a character named McNeal, the same name as Hartman’s character on NewsRadio.
Jack Soo died during the run of “Barney Miller.” It’s the first death of an actor during a show that I can remember. I loved that show. I loved that character. Ah me.
Dolph Sweet died during the run of “Gimme a Break!”
Just out of random memory:
The grandfather on My Three Sons ( I believe Ethel’s husband on " I Love Lucy" ) died during production on the show and was replaced.
The rising singer and actor, Aliya (named probably spelled wrong) I believed died in a plane crash accident during the movie “Queen of the Damned”. They used voice samples, and I believe doubles to finish her role. Also, she was in contracts to be now Jada Pinkett Smith’s character in The Matrix Reloaded/Revolutions.
First Post: BOO YAH!!!
Plus Lionel Hutz and, well, me.
Aaliyah. And they used her brother to do the voice samples.
From IMDB.com:
“Aaliyah died in a plane crash shortly after principal photography was completed. Michael Rymer called in Aaliyah’s brother, Rashad Haughton, to help overdubbing her voice following her death.”
13 year old Samantha Smith died in a plane crash while filiming the series “Lime Street.”
William Frawley played Uncle Bub, not the boy’s grandfather, on My Three Sons.
Zev Steinhardt
Orson Welles died during the making of the Transformers movie, and some of his dialogue was recorded by Leonard Nimoy.
Snopes has a nice page on actors who have died while films/TV shows were being made … or even whilst in front of live audiences:
The actor’s name was William Frawley, and that’s not exactly true. Frawley left the show after the 1964-5 season, because of his ill health (as did Tim Considine, who played “Mike”) He died the next year.