Movies - TV
The Only Surviving Stars Of The Beverly Hillbillies
By JEREMY SMITH
The Beverly Hillbillies ran for nine seasons and was one of the top-rated shows on TV in the '60s. Of the beloved cast, only one member is still with us today.
As the sixth-grade-educated Jethro, actor Max Baer Jr. found the trouble with playing a cultural caricature on a silly sitcom for close to a decade is being forever typecast.
When the series concluded, Baer Jr. tried to escape the dim hick stereotype. He teamed with filmmaker Richard Compton in 1974 to make a film called "Macon County Line."
The seamy yet sturdily crafted revenge film co-starring Baer Jr. as a Georgia sheriff out to kill a couple of Yankee interlopers wrongly accused of killing his wife was a hit.
Baer Jr. parlayed this surprise success into a brief yet highly profitable producing career. In 1976, he made a film based on Bobbie Gentry's song "Ode to Billie Joe."
The actor turned 86 last December and ultimately moved on from film production. He moved to Lake Tahoe, Nevada, and became a resort and casino owner.
Nowadays, he seems content to hit the golf course and regale reporters with his dream of becoming a hitman while thinking of ways to capitalize off of his "Hillbillies" fame.