On Monday, I wrote about the great Paul Newman as the great movie private detective Lew Harper.

Before I reached points on this cool 1966 film, I mentioned seeing Newman as Butch Cassidy, in the great western “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.” As a 14-year-old, I almost coughed up my M&Ms when Butch won his fight against Harvey Logan — Ted Cassidy — with an unexpected and well-placed kick.

I checked around on the Internet Movie Data Base about Ted, and found this kind of sad quote from the actor. He was once asked which role he would like to most be remembered for.

“None. None of them!” he said. “I don’t want to be remembered for any of them because I don’t like any of them. I’m not proud of any of them. I am still waiting for the one role I will have pride in and want to be associated with down the years.”

Boy, I can hear that full, sonorous voice booming now! Cassidy, who achieved his greatest fame as the somber butler Lurch on television’s “Addams Family” series, also said producers and directors always made large actors dumb galoots. Ted, a former basketball player and radio announcer who covered the JFK assassination in 1963, stood 6-feet-9.

“We are apparently idiots, all big men,” he said in 1978. “You end up never leading anybody to anything. You end up holding people, while the boss hits them in the face — scratching your head a lot wondering where all your marbles went. Well, that kind of thing doesn’t appeal to me at all. I used to think that’s how it was and I would do it, but I won’t do it anymore. I turn down everything that comes along like that.”

I think Ted was being a little hard on himself, and maybe the business. When producers needed a legitimate tough guy for “Butch Cassidy,” someone who exuded both strength and a sense of menace, Ted got the part. I think it was a tribute to the man’s acting skills.

The fight scene was his only significant appearance in the movie (I have always thought he was one of the outlaws outside the train Butch stops to rob, but am not sure) and the Harvey-Butch showdown has always been one of the most memorable sequences. Sure, part of the fun is watching Butch outsmart the guy who wants to take over his gang, but hearing Ted ask — in that deep voice — “Guns or knives, Butch?” really makes the scene.

You can check it out by clicking
here.

I know Ted didn’t get many plum acting roles during his career. Fans of the classic “Star Trek” series remember the actor from “What Are Little Girls Made Of,” in which he played a giant android that gets to slap Kirk around before the android master toasts him like a waffle. But out of all the original series’ bad guys, was any one of them more intimidating than old Ted? Even with that bad make-up?

Hardcore fans — I’m not one of them, I promise — might say, “What about the ‘Gorn’?” That was the giant lizard Kirk had to fight one-on-one in “Arena,” and yeah, that was Ted’s voice through the translator. That might be enough “Star Trek.” I’m really not a hardcore fan, honest!

My point is — Cassidy should have been proud of some of the roles he created for cinema and television. He was never going to be leading man, but so what? So many actors and actresses get no chances for starring roles, and few chances for bit roles. Then they are quickly forgotten.

Ted Cassidy was a real presence, a man who was terrific in supporting roles and voice roles for animated projects.

Cinema fans 40 years from now are going to appreciate his brief time in “Butch.”

I just wish Ted had appreciated his work a little bit himself. He died in 1979, after open heart surgery, at age 46.