https://www.thewrap.com/richard-gilliland-designing-women-character-actor-dies-at-71/

Richard Gilliland, a veteran character actor known for his work in “Designing Women” and “Airplane II: The Sequel,” and the husband to actress Jean Smart, has died. He was 71.

Gilliland died on March 18 in Los Angeles following a brief illness, his publicist told TheWrap.

The actor spent five years on the ’80s sitcom “Designing Women,” playing J.D. Shackelford, the boyfriend of Annie Potts’ character, Mary Jo Shively. Gilliland and Smart met on the show and got married in 1987. The two also shared the screen in a season of “24” in 2006.


He and Smart also worked together in stage productions of “It Had to Be You” and “Love Letters,” as well as the telefilms “Just My Imagination” and “Audrey’s Rain.”

Gilliland has over 90 acting credits in film and TV dating back to the 1970s, including dozens of guest appearances on shows such as “Criminal Minds,” “Dexter,” “Becker,” “Scandal,” “Joan of Arcadia,” “The Practice” and “Crossing Jordan.” He also had recurring roles on “Party of Five,” “The Waltons,” “Thirty Something,” “Dark Skies,” “Desperate Housewives” and more.

Richard Morris Gilliland was born on Jan. 23, 1950 in Fort Worth, Texas. He attended the prestigious Goodman School of Drama in Chicago. Before moving to Los Angeles, he played the role of Jesus in “Godspell” for a year opposite Joe Mantegna’s Judas. After arriving in Hollywood, Gilliland immediately began working and rarely stopped, starring as a series regular in “Operation Petticoat,” “Just Our Luck,” “McMillan,” Whatley By the Bay” and “Heartland.”

Gilliland also had a career on stage in Los Angeles, Chicago and off-Broadway in New York, appearing in productions such as “Amadeus,” “Cops,” “Beyond Therapy” and “Little Egypt.”

His film credits include “Airplane II: The Sequel,” “Home Room,” “Dog Watch,” “Vampire Clan,” “The Empath,” “BUG” and “Star Kid,” among others. He was next slated to work alongside Smart again this summer in a film directed by Tate Taylor.

Gilliland is survived by his wife, Jean, his two children, Connor and Bonnie (“Ani”), his sisters, Ann Norberg and Wendy Knaack, and his brother, John Wells.

Donations can be made here to the M.I.T. Institute for Medical Engineering and Science.

Rest in peace. I always liked his J.D. character.

Too young at 70. So sorry to hear he died.

Jean Smart remembers meeting her 'very forward and cheeky' late husband, Richard Gilliland, on “Designing Women” (https://www.msn.com/en-us/tv/celebrity/jean-smart-remembers-meeting-her-very-forward-and-cheeky-late-husband-richard-gilliland-on-designing-women/ar-AA22P6oI)

Smart, 74, opened up about appearing on the series on the May 6 episode of Wiser Than Me with Julia Louis-Dreyfus. The series followed Dixie Carter, Annie Potts, Delta Burke, Meshach Taylor and Smart, who worked at the Sugarbaker & Associates interior design firm.

Smart said she met Gilliland, who died in 2021 at the age of 71, when he guest-starred on the show's fifth episode.

“The show hadn't even aired yet,” she recalled, as Louis-Dreyfus, 65, noted she heard their romance was a “fast and furious love affair.”

“I remember we were doing our table read, and I remember I started to head upstairs, where the room was where we were gonna do the table read,” Smart remembered. “And I saw him standing there talking to somebody, and he looked familiar.”

Smart had “seen him in some stuff,” but was especially attracted to “that smile and those little smile lines.”

“And I thought, ‘Oh, I hope he's here to be on our show,'” she said. When she walked into the room for the read-through, there he was. Gilliland was ultimately cast as J.D. Shackelford, the boyfriend of Potts' Mary Jo.

“I was the only one of the four of us gals who he had not either met or worked with before. In fact, he dated Delta briefly,” the Hacks star remembered.

They hit it off very quickly. “He was very forward and cheeky. He was very funny,” she said. “And I guess that helped let me be sort of forward, too. And I invited him into my trailer a couple times to help me with crossword puzzles and stuff like that.”

Louis-Dreyfus joked, “Oh, crossword puzzle, in quotes.”

Smart remembered that Gilliland had invited her to see a play he was doing. “And, of course, I went, like, 17 times,” she said.

“I remember I told him, after a few days, I said, ‘You know, the only reason I'm being really nice to you,' I said, ‘is because every week, one of us is assigned to sort of take care of the guest star on the show,' ” Smart said. “And this is my week.” Smart laughed and added, “He didn't buy that laugh.”

Smart and Gilliland married in June 1987. The actress got pregnant with their son Connor not long after, giving birth in October 1989. Louis-Dreyfus noted that, unlike her experience as Elaine on Seinfeld, the writers of Designing Women wrote her pregnancy into the show.

“They married my character off just in time,” Smart joked. “Because I remember the night that my character got married is the night I found out I was pregnant.”

The seven-time Emmy winner remembered, “I was sitting in my dressing room, wearing this tight corseted wedding dress. I'm smoking a cigarette, and I'm looking at myself in the mirror. I'm going, ‘Jean, you are pregnant. You know you are pregnant.' ”

She got the message from her doctor confirming her pregnancy that night. “I just put out the cigarette. I said, ‘That's it. No more of those.' ”

Smart appeared on Designing Women through the show's fifth season, which ended in 1991. The series itself wrapped at the end of season 7, in 1993. Smart reunited with Carter, Burke, Potts and Taylor for the 2003 reunion special.

Smart — who also starred on Frasier, Samantha Who?, Fargo and Watchmen — added to her family with Gilliland when they adopted son Forrest in 2010, when he was 18 months old.

The actress also appeared on the TV series 24 with her husband. Smart played First Lady Martha Logan during season 5, which aired in 2006. Meanwhile, Gilliland played Captain Stan Cotter in an episode.

Smart reflected on Gilliland's death in a 2024 episode of Who's Talking to Chris Wallace?, calling his March 2021 death from an unexpected heart condition “the worst.”

"Because it was such a shock. It was so unexpected," she said. "And, you know, I thought he had COVID or something.”

She reflected, “Losing your mate of 35 years. I mean, literally half my life I lived with him, is just kind of indescribable. And it's just — you go through this period of thinking it's just not real. It's just, this isn't real. You know? This just doesn't make any sense."