Star of iconic ’90s sitcom looks unrecognizable with trim frame as he steps out in LA – can you guess who?
He was featured in one of the biggest sitcoms of the 1990s.
He played a major supporting role in the Tim Allen starrer from 1991 until the 1999 hit finale.
This actor has also had a varied career, including a multi-year stint as host of a popular game show in the 2000s.
And he enjoyed a career resurgence starting in 2019 with a recurring role on the critically acclaimed Hulu series Pen15.
Can you name this veteran television and film actor?
He starred in one of the biggest sitcoms of the ’90s, became the fourth host of Family Feud and enjoyed a late-career renaissance on Hulu’s PEN15. Do you know who he is?
He is 68-year-old film and TV actor Richard Karn, who is best known for co-starring with Tim Allen (R) on the ratings giant Home Improvement (pictured) from 1991 to 1999.
He is 68-year-old Richard Karn, who is best known for playing Tim Allen’s loyal sidekick on their classic ’90s sitcom Home Improvement.
Karn was pictured with his wife Tudi Roche earlier this month as they went grocery shopping in Los Angeles.
The actor was dressed casually in a spotted blue, red and gold short-sleeved golf shirt, navy blue shorts and gray loafers.
He looked significantly different from his ’90s heyday. Karn had slimmed down, a departure from his heartier figure on Home Improvement, but it was his mostly white beard and gray hair that made her look noticeably different from his Home Improvement counterparts. character.
He played Al Borland, the co-host of the show-within-a-show, Tool Time, a fictional home improvement series hosted by Allen’s character, Tim “The Tool Man” Taylor.
Al was the less telegenic of the duo, but he was also the real expert on tools and construction, rather than Tim.
Karn had an instantly recognizable uniform for the series: a sort of plaid flannel shirt and a thick beard that was sometimes the butt of Allen’s jokes.
The actor began as a recurring character on the series after taking the place of Groundhog Day actor Stephen Tobolowsky, who was forced to drop out after the pilot episode conflicted with a film project he was working on.
Although Karn was a replacement, he proved to be a hit with viewers, and in the second season of Home Improvement he was moved up to the main cast.
Karn wore a red and blue golf shirt and navy blue shorts with gray loafers. He had slimmed down from his sturdy ’90s figure, but his white beard and gray hair made him look unrecognizable compared to the thick, dark hair he sported on Home Improvement.
He played Al Borland, the less prominent co-host of Tim Allen’s Tim ‘The Tool Man’ Taylor
Al, who also wore plaid flannel shirts and sported his bushy beard, was a likable man but less telegenic than Tim, even if he was the real tool expert.
Following Home Improvement’s conclusion after eight seasons in 1999, Karn took over as the fourth solo host of Family Feud in 2002.
He left the series in 2006, when Seinfeld actor John O’Hurley replaced him.
He later hosted another game show, Bingo America from 2008 to 2009, and remained an in-demand guest star on television.
Karn had one of his most high-profile roles since 2019, when he began appearing on the critically acclaimed Hulu comedy series PEN15.
The series was created by writers and stars Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle, who played fictional versions of themselves from the age of thirteen.
The women were both in their early thirties, creating a surreally hilarious contrast to the rest of the age-appropriate child actors who populated their high school.
Karn appeared in several episodes as Maya’s father, a drummer for struggling cover bands who was often on the road and away from home. (In reality, Erskine’s father is respected jazz drummer and former Weather Report member Peter Erskine.)
In 2021, the creators and stars announced that the show’s second season would be its last.
He enjoyed a career resurgence with a major recurring role in Anna Konkle and Maya Erskine’s critically acclaimed Hulu comedy PEN15. He played Erskine’s father (R)
Karn later hosted Family Feud from 2002 to 2006, and he reunited with Tim Allen in 2021 on the home repair competition Assembly Required, and then in 2022 on the tool-themed series More Power; pictured in 2017 in Burbank, California.
That year, Karn reunited with Allen for the pandemic-based Home Improvement-inspired series Assembly Required, a home repair competition.
The two were guests of April Wilkerson, and she rejoined them in 2022 for the series More Power, which followed the three’s evolution from classic tools to some of the latest tech-inspired gadgets around.
Although Karn has appeared in supporting roles in several films, he did not appear in his first film until Legend Of The Mummy in 1998, although he has worked steadily in film since then.
Last year, Karn appeared in two episodes of the revived Jonathan Frakes-hosted series Beyond Belief, and he has several low-budget films and shows on the horizon.