Dick Van Dyke is one of the most beloved actors of all time. The Emmy, Grammy, Golden Globe, and Tony Award-winning star has logged dozens of stage, small screen, and film credits in a career that has spanned more than 70 years.
He’s appeared in everything from Broadway musicals to a guest role on the soap opera “Days of Our Lives” to a Coldplay video – and there’s no sign of him slowing down. In a 2021 interview with “The Today Show,” the actor said, “I don’t think I’ll ever retire unless they make me. It’s too much fun.”
Van Dyke turned 99 years old on December 13, 2024. In honor of his big birthday, here’s a look at some of his most memorable film and television roles.
5. ‘Bye Bye Birdie’ (1963)
Dick Van Dyke kicked off his film career back in 1963 when he reprised his Broadway role as songwriter Albert Peterson in the big screen version of “Bye Bye Birdie.” This role is notable because it put Van Dyke on the map as a movie actor. Still, he admitted to The Wrap that he preferred the stage version of the romantic comedy musical, for which he won a Tony Award. “What kind of disappointed me was the movie version of ‘Birdie,’”he told the outlet in a 2024 interview. “They added some songs that I didn’t think were right. They took a really good Broadway musical and Hollywoodized it.”
4. ‘Diagnosis Murder’ (1993-2001)
For eight seasons in the 1990s, Van Dyke played Dr, Mark Sloan in the medical mystery drama “Diagnosis Murder.” What made this show especially interesting is that the actor co-starred with his role-life son, Barry Van Dyke.
In an interview with The Television Academy, Van Dyke said he always believed he could do dramatic work despite his background in comedy and musicals. “Some of my friends who have written for me for comedy, I’ve worked with in comedy, said, ‘It’ll never go, the public wants to see you do comedy and it just isn’t going to work.’ But I didn’t really believe that. I thought this character could have enough of an eccentricity in his personality that he would still be kind of interesting to watch.”
3. ‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang‘ (1968)
Speaking of eccentricity, in 1968, Van Dyke played flying car inventor Caractacus Potts in the whimsical fantasy film “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.”
In his memoir “My Lucky Life In and Out of Show Business,” Van Dyke revealed he had a stipulation for doing the film, which was set in England. “I didn’t want to reprise my English accent, which I’d struggled with in ‘Mary Poppins.’ Not a problem. My character was suddenly an eccentric American inventor,” he shared.
Van Dyke pulled out all the stops with his dance moves, but he later told Awards Radar some of the dances were hard to do. “I think ‘The Old Bamboo’ number from Chitty Bang Bang, I think that is probably the toughest. The number ends with all the dancers jumping over their bamboo sticks. And every time one dancer would miss. So we did about 25 takes. And they were all kids in their 20s. I was 40-something. I just made it. 25 takes of jumping over that stick. It’s amazing.”
2. ‘Mary Poppins’ (1964)
One of Van Dyke’s most beloved roles was in the 1964 film “Mary Poppins.” The Academy Award-winning film featured the actor as chimney sweep/street artist Bert alongside Julie Andrews as the title character. Van Dyke’s “Step in Time” rooftop dance is one of his most famous scenes in the movie.
In an interview with the New York Times, Van Dyke talked about all of the “flying” the cast did in the film. “We had to fly constantly,” he shared. “One day we were all up there doing ‘I Love to Laugh’ and they broke for lunch, and everybody left and forgot that we were hanging up there. It must have been 15 minutes before somebody realized and came and let us down.”
1.‘The Dick Van Dyke Show’ (1961-1966)
For five years, Van Dyke entertained TV viewers with his role as Rob Petrie on “The Dick Van Dyke Show.” The self-titled CBS sitcom featured the actor playing a writer on “The Alan Brady Show.” Mary Tyler Moore played his wife, Laura. Van Dyke told “Today” he loved working on the Carl Reiner-produced comedy.
“I think the five years on ‘The Dick Van Dyke Show’ with Carl [Reiner] and Mary [Tyler Moore] was the most fun I ever had,” he said. “Carl didn’t write things in stone. Everybody got to throw in their idea. So from the first reading, until we did it on the show, it was a different show altogether.”
He also told Awards Radar that “far and away” the “Dick Van Dyke Show” was his greatest work experience. “It was like going to a party every day,” he explained. “It was just a ball. We had such fun making up the comedy. I’m a little disappointed that the reruns are cut to pieces because of more commercials. It really breaks my heart.”
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