Ed Asner
American actor (1929–2021)
Eddie Asner (; November 15, 1929 – August 29, 2021) was an American actor. He is most notable for portraying Lou Grant on the sitcom The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970–1977) and drama Lou Grant (1977–1982), making him one of the few television actors to portray the same character in both a comedy and a drama.
Asner won seven Primetime Emmy Awards, the most of any male performer. Five were for portraying Lou Grant: three as Supporting Actor in a Comedy Television Series on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and two as Lead Actor in a Dramatic Television Series on the spin-off Lou Grant. The other two were for performances in the miniseries Rich Man, Poor Man (1976) and Roots (1977).
Asner acted in the films El Dorado (1966), They Call Me Mister Tibbs! (1970), Fort Apache, The Bronx (1981), JFK (1991), and Too Big to Fail (2011). He also played Santa Claus in several films and voiced Carl Fredricksen in the Pixar animated film Up (2009).
Asner starred in the ABC sitcom Thunder Alley (1994–1995), and Michael: Every Day (2011–2017). He also acted extensively in numerous television series such as The Practice, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, The Good Wife, Cobra Kai, Briarpatch, Working Class, and Dead to Me.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Ed Asner” as american actor (1929–2021). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as american actor (1929–2021). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 9, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q154421. VIAF identifies the subject as 54355695. The Library of Congress control number is n81027790. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1929, 2021, 1970 and 1977.
Public reputation and documentary evidence do not always develop together; absence from a summary is not evidence of historical absence. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ed Asner” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.