Gilligan has left the island; the three-hour tour has finally come to a close. Bob Denver was best known as the awkward and bumbling lead on the sixties TV show Gilligan’s Island. His life ended quietly on Friday, September 2nd at Wake Forest University Hospital in North Carolina. Denver suffered from cancer and his death was associated with a complication from the treatments he was undergoing.
Denver’s breakthrough role was that of Maynard G. Krebs on the late fifties, early sixties series “The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis.” Krebs was essentially a caricature of a beatnik whose goal in life was to play bongos and do as little work as possible. Though making no claims to beat culture, Denver brought the character to life with his signature comedic talent. The show was important in that it was one of the first to depict the world from the perspective of a young adult. While the sitcom did mock beat culture, it also gave a voice to a growing culture that contradicted social norms. Denver made nationwide headlines in 1998 when he was arrested for possession after police intercepted a delivery of marijuana to his West Virginia home. The actor pleaded no contest and received a light slap on the wrist, six months of unsupervised probation.
Much unlike the television personas he helped to define as an actor, Denver was a quiet man devoted to his family and charity work. He was the founder of the Denver Foundation, an organization that benefits handicapped residents of West Virginia, the state where Denver was born and raised.
Denver is survived by his wife, Dreama, their four children and one granddaughter.