Joseph V. Perry

Perry began his acting career in his youth, winning the Glenn Ford Award at Santa Monica High School in California in 1949. His successes continued in 1952 when he was presented the best actor award at UCLA by Marlon Brando. Perry officially started his film career in 1955 at the age of 24 and spent the next 45 years appearing in literally hundreds of films and television shows from dramatic anthologies to westerns to medical dramas, police dramas to classic sitcoms. He got one of his first big roles when he appeared in The Twilight Zone. He was a dependable if not outstanding character actor and he appeared on many varied but popular shows such as Rawhide, Dr. Kildare, Official Detective, Bewitched, M*A*S*H, I Dream of Jeannie, and The Partridge Family. In the 1970s his visibility peaked with guest appearances on shows of the day like Mannix, Emergency!, The Streets of San Francisco, Sara, and Kojak. However, he failed to land any mainstream acting roles until 1978, when he got several roles in shows such as The Incredible Hulk, MacGyver, Cheers, Murder, She Wrote and Seinfeld. It was on the series Everybody Loves Raymond that he got his biggest break, when he gained the role of Nemo, a pizza restaurant owner. He started playing the role in 1998 and it lasted until his death in early 2000.

In February 2000, Perry, who had been suffering with diabetes, got worse and he died due to the illness 10 days after his 69th birthday. His character's last appearance in Everybody Loves Raymond was shown posthumously when his restaurant got bought out. Nemo's last two appearances were played by Robert Ruth. He is survived by 4 daughters and 1 son.