Bill Cobbs, Actor from ‘Bodyguard’ and ‘Museum,’ Dies at 90

Bill Cobbs, a brilliant character actor whose half-century career covered everything from “Sesame Street” to “The Sopranos” to “Night at the Museum,” died Tuesday evening. He was ninety.

His brother, Thomas G. Cobbs, confirmed his death on social media, and his agent, Carmela Evangelista, verified it. He died at home in California’s Inland Empire. No cause of death was specified.

Mr. Cobbs was seldom a Hollywood celebrity, but his look was familiar to everyone who had watched television or movies in recent decades. He performed in over 200 films and television series and was a well-known theatrical performer.

Born Wilbert Francisco Cobbs in Cleveland, Mr. Bill Cobbs worked eight years in the Air Force as a radar specialist, when he began doing standup comedy, according to a 2012 interview with the podcast “Movie Geeks United.” He worked additionally for IBM and as a car salesperson.

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His performance in Ossie Davis’ play “Purlie Victorious,” a comedy about a Black preacher’s struggles to recover his local church, significantly impacted his career.

“That play showed me that there were many significant things I could express in theater, on stage, in movies, and on television. In addition to entertaining people and touching them in various ways, there were important things you could say about the human condition,” he said.

According to his IMDb page, he traveled to New York in 1970 at 36 to pursue acting and did odd jobs such as toy sales, taxi driving, and office equipment maintenance.

“His professional acting debut was in ‘Ride a Black Horse’ at the Negro Ensemble Company. He worked for several years performing in regional theaters and Broadway productions such as ‘Black Picture Show’ and ‘Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.'”

His first television credit came from “Vegetable Soup,” a public television series for youngsters that attempted to combat prejudice.

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His big-screen debut was a small role as a guy on a platform in a blockbuster film, the 1974 thriller “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three.” In an interview with Cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer in 2013, he stated that he just had one sentence.

“I went back home to see my parents, and all of our neighbors and friends went to see the movie. Everyone was waiting to see how I looked,” he told me. “I approach a cop in the metro and say, ‘Hey, guy. “What’s going on?”

In the 1980s, he appeared in films such as “Trading Places,” “The Brother From Another Planet,” and “The Color of Money,” which starred Paul Newman and Tom Cruise. Then, in 1987, he won a job starring with Dabney Coleman (who died in May) in the one-season ABC sitcom “The Slap Maxwell Story.”

More recurrent parts followed on “I’ll Fly Away,” “The Gregory Hines Show,” “The Drew Carey Show,” and, most recently, “Go On,” which starred Matthew Perry.

Mr. Bill Cobbs’ television performances chronicle the history of the medium throughout the last five decades, including “Good Times,” “One Life to Live,” “L.A. Law,” “Kate and Allie,” “Spenser: For Hire,” “Sesame Street,” “I’ll Fly Away,” “ER,” “Northern Exposure,” “Walker, Texas Ranger,” “The Sopranos,” “The West Wing,” “NYPD Blue,” “JAG,” “One Tree Hill,” “Star Trek: Enterprise,” “Six Feet Under,” “Superior Donuts” or “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.”

Some of his famous film roles include Whitney Houston’s manager in “The Bodyguard,” a clock man in “The Hudsucker Proxy,” a coach in “Air Bud,” concerning a basketball-playing dog, a police officer in the thriller “Demolition Man,” a famous jazz pianist in “That Thing You Do!”, Master Tinker in “Oz the Great and Powerful,” and a doctor in the drama “Sunshine State.”

According to his publicist, Chuck I. Jones, one of his most notable roles was playing the security officer in “Night at the Museum,” with Ben Stiller, Dick Van Dyke, and Mickey Rooney, which he returned in the sequel, “Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb.”

Mr. Bill Cobbs received a Daytime Emmy Award in 2020 for his work on the television show “Dino Dana,” which follows a youngster who loves dinosaurs.

His final credited performance was in the 2023 mini-series “Incandescent Love.”

“I enjoy what I do, I enjoy it,” he stated in a 2012 interview. “It’s wonderful to have a project to work on and see it come to realization, so I can find joy doing this so much.”