For quite some time, there has been some confusion surrounding the character of Chester Anderson, one of Wally’s friends on the first through third seasons of the sitcom Leave it to Beaver. The confusion centers around the actor who played Chester Anderson. Was it Buddy Hart, the actor listed in the closing credits of each Leave it to Beaver episode, or was he Buddy Joe Hooker? What? Who’s Buddy Joe Hooker?
Buddy Joe Hooker,
the actor turned stuntman and stunt coordinator.
For years, the Internet Movie Database had two listings for the actor who played Chester Anderson. The first listing had an actor named Buddy Hart who began his career on the Schlitz Playhouse (1957) and his acting credits ran through Sweet Charity (1969) where the actor played an uncredited role as a baseball player. The original IMDB page was https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0393612, but that page now re-directs to the current page https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0366179. The second listing was for an actor/stuntman named Buddy Joe Hooker. That IMDB page had no credits before 1970. There was also no listing for and no mention of Buddy Joe Hooker having played Chester Anderson on Leave it to Beaver. These two separate IMDB pages existed until the middle of 2015. Over the years, the Wikipedia page for “Buddy Hart” has also changed. At one point, the page listed acting credits, now it doesn’t. As Wikipedia says, the current Buddy Hart Wikipedia page “has multiple issues” which need corrected. More importantly, the page should re-direct to the Buddy Joe Hooker page, and not be a page of its own.
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Okay, so who played Chester Anderson on Leave it to Beaver, was it Buddy Hart or Buddy Joe Hooker? Well, for years, according to IMDB, Buddy Hart played Chester Anderson on Leave it to Beaver. According to that same old IMDB page for Buddy Hart, it listed his father as John Hart, an actor who played in three different episodes of Leave it to Beaver, the best known being his role as a scout master in “Lonesome Beaver” from season one. John Hart was most popular for playing the Lone Ranger on a couple seasons of that world famous TV western after Clayton Moore left due to an impasse in contract talks. There’s only one problem with this John Hart/Buddy Hart father son scenario, Buddy Hart was a stage name. So, there is no way his father was once the Lone Ranger actor John Hart.
One of the biggest problems I had in figuring out the real actor who played Wally’s friend Chester Anderson is some misinformation I found from November 2014 on a Leave it to Beaver Facebook group which stated that Nathaniel “Buddy” Anderson grew up and changed his name to Buddy Joe Hooker and later went on to become a world famous stuntman, perhaps the most famous stuntman in the world. Who knows where that misinformation came from? It certainly didn’t come from the person who posted it on Facebook. Misinformation just happens sometimes.
Now, if you want to know who played Chester Anderson on Leave it to Beaver, the answer …. drum roll please…. BUDDY JOE HOOKER! But… actor Buddy Hart didn’t change his name to Buddy Joe Hooker a decade after his child acting years were over. It was actually the other way around. Buddy Joe Hooker, the son of actor and stuntman Hugh Hooker, used the stage name of Buddy Hart when his acting career began. Whether or not that career began with him playing a hitchhiker on the Schlitz Playhouse in 1957 as IMDB states or on Rin Tin Tin as his bio page on the stuntsunlimited.com website claims, is up for debate. I would believe his bio page at stuntsunlimited because after further research, I found that his father was an actor on Rin Tin Tin for three episodes in 1955. The pool of child actors at the time was not very deep in Hollywood for television roles so its most probable that Buddy Joe got his acting start on Rin Tin Tin.
To figure out this entire mystery, I had to enlist the help of Christopher Lynch, a great detective. Well, Christopher Lynch may not be a real life detective, but he is the creator of an amazing detective character and author of the One-Eyed Jack series of detective novels. He is also the author of EDDIE: The Life and Times of America’s Preeminent Bad Boy. If you’re a true Leave it to Beaver fan, you must have already purchased your copy of Eddie. If not, buy your copy today.
After all of my confusion, which included viewing Buddy Joe Hooker’s resume page on his official website and seeing his claim that he played Chester Anderson on Leave it to Beaver (something no one would make up since it would be so easy to debunk), I knew I needed help, so I wrote Christopher and he said he’d ask his sources. Well, a couple phone calls later to Tony Dow and Ken Osmond did the trick. I received this message from Christopher on June 11, 2015, “Hey Brian, I just got off the phone with Ken and Tony and they confirmed that yes, they (Buddy Joe Hooker and Buddy Hart) are one in the same. You can quote me on that one.” Consider yourself quoted Chris.
It wasn’t but a few weeks later when I checked IMDB for the Buddy Hart page and it was gone. I checked the Buddy Joe Hooker page and it was corrected to show his work as an actor in the 1950s and 1960s, including Leave it to Beaver. There is still one big discrepancy on his current IMDB page. It states in his mini-bio that he was born as Buddy Nathaniel Hart. I guess with all bureaucracies, even with internet databases, it takes a while to get things fixed. Maybe by the time you read this article, IMDB will have fixed that one problem. One glaring oversight on IMDB is in the “self” category as IMDB does not list his appearance on a 1969 episode of The Dating Game with a 22 year old Farrah Fawcett. Buddy Joe Hooker, or Joey Hooker, as he was called on the show, was bachelor #2 and he was the winner. Check out that episode here and if you want to see Jerry Mather’s appearance on The Dating Game three years earlier, click here.
After watching all fifteen Leave it to Beaver episodes which include Chester Anderson, I knew the actor who played him was quite athletic and had the ability to be a stuntman. He just looked the part when he played sandlot baseball in episode The Lost Watch or when he played basketball in The Perfect Father episode. Buddy Joe Hooker’s prowess in his future endeavors as a stuntman and stunt coordinator is worth noting. Here is just a partial list of stunt work credits:
As Stunt Coordinator:
To Live and Die in L.A.
The Right Stuff
Jack Frost
Meet Joe Black
The Godfather Part III
The Chase
Terminal Velocity
Grosse Pointe Blank
Rules of Engagement
Vanilla Sky
The Hunted
Hard to Kill
Gleaming the Cube
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
White Line Fever
The Outsiders
(see even more)
As a Stunt Performer:
Independence Day: Resurgence
Django Unchained
Horrible Bosses
Superbad
Grindhouse
Spy Kids
Gone in 60 Seconds
Soldier
Lethal Weapon 4
Star Trek: First Contact
Executive Decision
Waterworld
The Crow
Carlito’s Way
Demolition Man
Last Action Hero
Scarface (his father Hugh Hooker also did stunts in this film)
Lethal Weapon 3
Thelma & Louise
Days of Thunder
Lethal Weapon 2
Great Balls of Fire
Road House
The Presidio
F/X
Against All Odds
Blazing Saddles
Octopussy
(see even more)
