Dick Wilson, (30 July 1916 – 19 November 2007), was a British-born Canadian character actor who played the role of finicky grocery store manager Mr. George Whipple in more than 500 Charmin toilet paper television commercials (1965–1989, 1999-2000).

Biography

Dick Wilson was born in Preston, Lancashire, England, to Veronica and Randolf Wilson. His father performed in vaudeville; his mother was a singer. In late 1916, his father moved the family to Hamilton, Ontario, Canada where he spent his childhood in the Corktown district and on the Mountain, attending Queen Victoria and Sacred Heart Schools. He had a Hamilton Spectator newspaper route and got his start in show business with a part-time job at CHML radio in Hamilton at age fifteen.

Wilson graduated from the Ontario College of Art & Design and then became a comic dancer in vaudeville. He enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force and served as a pilot in World War II. After the war he moved to the United States and became an American citizen in 1954. He then worked as an acrobatic dancer in New York before heading to California in 1954 for film and TV work.

Wilson made numerous appearances as several characters on the television sitcom Bewitched, usually as the drunk. He reprised his role as "the drunk" on the Bewitched spin-off Tabitha and McHale's Navy. Sometimes on the latter he portrayed a neighbour or other stock character in various episodes between 33 and 247. He played a similar drunk character in Disney's The World's Greatest Athlete in 1973. Wilson also appeared on The Donna Reed Show, Hogan's Heroes, and The Bob Newhart Show.

Wilson was quoted as saying, "I've done thirty-eight pictures and nobody remembers any of them, but they all remember me selling toilet paper." Wilson made 504 commercials as Mr. Whipple, earning U.S. $300,000 annually and working only 12-16 days a year.

In an interview with ABC News on 22 April 1983, he mentioned that the first series of commercials for Charmin toilet paper he appeared in were filmed in, appropriately enough, Flushing, New York.

He described acting in commercials as "the hardest thing to do in the entire acting realm. You've got 24 seconds to introduce yourself, introduce the product, say something nice about it and get off gracefully."