Jay Thomas, an actor and radio personality whose work on the television series “Murphy Brown” won him two Emmy Awards in the early 1990s, died on Thursday at his home in Santa Barbara, Calif. He was 69.
The cause was cancer, his agent, Don Buchwald, said.
Mr. Thomas was a disc jockey in 1979 when he was cast in a recurring role on “Mork & Mindy,” the ABC sitcom about a space alien played by Robin Williams. Mr. Thomas played Remo DaVinci, co-owner of a deli, and appeared in dozens of episodes during the run of the show, which ended in 1982.
After that, the work came fairly regularly, often in the form of smaller TV roles but also the occasional movie appearance, most notably in “Mr. Holland’s Opus” in 1995.
Between “Mork & Mindy” and “Murphy Brown” his most prominent role was a recurring spot on “Cheers” in the 1980s as Eddie LeBec, an ice hockey player who was married to Carla Tortelli (Rhea Perlman), a waitress at the Boston bar of the show’s title.
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Mr. Thomas was one of the main characters in “Love & War,” a CBS sitcom that ran for three seasons beginning in 1992. His other television credits included the ABC ensemble series “Married People” in the early 1990s and the recent Showtime series “Ray Donovan.”
Mr. Thomas’s good looks and ability to play a wiseacre were something of a calling card, and his secondary roles could brighten even a weak show or movie. When he and Joan Cusack played best friends to the central couple in the 1997 movie “A Smile Like Yours,” Janet Maslin wrote in her review in The New York Times, “Ms. Cusack, Mr. Thomas and a brief bit about budget airlines are notably funnier than the rest of the film.”
His quick tongue also served him well on the talk-show circuit. He was especially ubiquitous on “Late Show With David Letterman,” where he appeared every Christmas season and always told the same story about meeting Clayton Moore, the actor who played the Lone Ranger on TV, a tale that also involved marijuana and a broken headlight. (Mr. Thomas, an athlete in his younger days, would also engage in a challenge that involved throwing footballs at a Christmas tree.)