American actor Robert Reed was BOTD in 1932. Born John Rietz Jr in Chicago and raised in Texas and Oklahoma, he studied acting at Northwestern University and London’s Royal Academy of Dramatic Art before joining an off-Broadway theatre group. He moved to California in the 1950s to pursue acting, eventually getting his big break in popular TV series The Defenders. After appearing on Broadway in Barefoot in the Park, he was cast in TV sitcom The Brady Bunch, playing a widower with three sons who marries a divorced woman with three daughters. Considered ground-breaking at the time for portraying a blended family, the show became phenomenally successful, running from 1968 to 1974. Reed fought constantly with the show’s writers and producers, considering the material facile and not worthy of his talents, but participated in Brady Bunch spin-offs and parodies throughout his career. Post-Brady, he appeared mostly in television, earning Emmy nominations for his role as a transgender doctor in TV series Medical Center and appearances in mini-series Rich Man, Poor Man and Roots. He also made guest appearances in camp TV classics including Wonder Woman, Hawaii Five-O, Charlie’s Angels, Fantasy Island, The Love Boat and Murder, She Wrote. He married Marilyn Rosenberger in 1954, with whom he had a daughter, divorced in 1959. Reed kept his homosexuality a secret throughout his life, dying in 1991, aged 59. Though his cause of death was officially colon cancer, his death certificate revealed that he was HIV-positive. After his death, his Brady Bunch co-stars discussed Reed’s unhappiness over his sexuality, at odds with his public image as America’s favourite TV father.