William Talman

William Talman was an American actor who began on the stage and became known as a screen villain. He was the leading man of a summer stock company in Ivoryton, Connecticut, took the male lead in Dear Ruth for part of that play's New York run, and appeared on Broadway in Beverly Hills, Spring Again and A Young Man's Fancy. His film breakthrough came in Richard Fleischer's 1950 noir Armored Car Robbery, as a career criminal who planned the title heist. He was a sadistic killer in The Hitch-Hiker (1953), a performance The New York Times singled out. From 1957 to 1966 he played Los Angeles District Attorney Hamilton Burger on Perry Mason, losing all but three cases. He also guest-starred on Gunsmoke, Wagon Train, Cimarron City and Have Gun Will Travel, and later appeared on The Wild, Wild West and The Invaders. He died in 1968.