We don't normally do obituaries here, but this is a special case...
For many people, the demise of Adam West is the same as the death of Batman. They were intertwined and interchangeable. Despite the lunacy of the television show, if you had to choose a Batman to help you out of a spot, it would be Adam West who would pop into your mind. He WAS Batman, and he will be missed.
Despite the immense popularity of 'Batman', Adam West never really managed to move on from the connection to the cowl, and it's a shame. It wasn't just stereotyping at work, though, as no-one made it out of the 1960s into the 1970s as a television lead. The cull was comprehensive, and only with five to ten years of exile did any regulars make it back to work at all. Several generations of actors binned in one fell swoop meant West, Shatner, Don Adams, Richard Basehart, Bob Denver and anyone else you can remember vanished into lives of obscurity.
Adam West was an interesting actor. It was shocking to see him appear in 'Maverick', years before 'Batman', and actually play a convincing role as an ambiguous/villainous cowboy. He did it well, unbelievably! A nuanced performance! Then, with the hideously delayed DVD release of 'Batman', the series not the movie, we finally got to see the full scope of his performance and realised that he was an incredibly smart actor. He was playing impossible material almost perfectly, and which no-one else could possibly have done as well with. He was perfect, brilliantly paced, and the show would have been a hopeless mess without him, even with that magnificent rogue's gallery of special guest villains.
After 'Batman', Adam West struggled, but he eventually made a comeback by playing... Adam West? He became a voice actor, a cult hero, and a legend.
Go in peace, Adam West, you made the world a better and weirder place.
O.
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