Leonard Stone – Willy Wonka’s Sam Beauregarde Dead at 87

“I’m getting even with you for this, Wonka, if it’s the last thing I ever do! I’ve got a blueberry for a daughter!”

I remember him well as the cosmic zookeeper Farnum on two episodes of Lost In Space. A familiar face, Leonard Stone earned a Tony nomination for his work in the 1959 musical Redhead and appeared on numerous television shows such as L.A. Law, Perry Mason, General Hospital, Mission: Impossible, Barney Miller, Gunsmoke, and Hill Street Blues but he’ll always be best remembered as Sam Beauregarde,  motor-mouthed politician and father of Violet Beauregarde in Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory (1971). Though mostly a TV actor, Stone also had a memorable role in Soylent Green as the manager of the building in which Joseph Cotten was killed. In September of 2000, he appeared as an ordinary, non-celebrity contestant on Wheel of Fortune. He placed second, winning $4,250.

Leonard Stone, the acto who played the father of Violet Beauregarde in 1971's "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," died Wednesday, November 2nd, after battling cancer. He would have turned 88 Thursday. Though Stone is best known for his Beauregarde role, whose most famous line was "Violet! You're turning violet!," the actor had numerous parts on TV shows, films and also Broadway. He appeared in television shows "Lost in Space," "Mod Squad," "Mission: Impossible," "M*A*S*H" and "La Law," as well as "Toys in the Attic" and "I Love My Wife" (among others) on the big screen. Stone was nominated for a Tony for his performance in "Redhead" on Broadway.