Bill Thurman

quently acted in features for legendary Grade Z low-budget independent filmmaker Larry Buchanan; said movies include "The Eye Creatures," "High Yellow," "Zontar the Thing from Venus," "Mars Needs Women," "Curse of the Swamp Creature," "In the Year 2889," the especially atrocious "It's Alive!," and "A Bullet for Pretty Boy." Moreover, Thurman had bit parts in two Steven Spielberg films: he's a hillbilly hunter in "The Sugerland Express" and an air traffic controller in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind." Bill's other memorable roles include the abusive Coach Popper in Peter Bogdanovich's magnificent "The Last Picture Show," a doomed hitchhiker in "Keep My Grave Open," a corrupt sheriff in the Claudia Jennings exploitation classic "'Gatorbait," a mean small town deputy in "Ride in A Pink Car," a more amiable sheriff in the fantastic Bigfoot winner "Creature from Black Lake," Cheryl "Rainbeaux" Smith's father in "Slumber Party '57," a priest in "The Evictors," and the boozy, dissolute Reverend Bill McWiley in the enjoyably crummy "Mountaintop Motel Massacre." Bill Thurman died in Dallas, Texas on April 13, 1995. - IMDb Mini Biography By: woodyanders