Tom Dreesen

Tom Dreesen was an American stand-up comic and actor. He grew up in Harvey, Illinois. In 1968, while selling insurance, he met Tim Reid, and they formed Tim and Tom, an interracial comedy team that was the first of its kind in the country. After the pair split in the mid-1970s, Dreesen was a regular on Johnny Carson's The Tonight Show, appeared on Match Game, and toured as the opening performer for Frank Sinatra. Following Sinatra's death, he took the autobiographical show Shoeshines to Sinatra on a national tour. His screen credits included Columbo, WKRP in Cincinnati, Murder, She Wrote, and the films Spaceballs, The Rat Pack, and Trouble with the Curve (2012). A comedy album, That White Boy's Crazy, arrived in 1989 on Flying Fish Records. In 1999, he received a Golden Palm Star along the Palm Springs Walk of the Stars. His memoir, Still Standing, was published in 2020.