Anyone who enjoyed tuning in to watch the duo of Roy DeSoto and Johnny Gage save lives on Emergency! will be glad to hear that the two actors who played them have remained friends. From 1972 to 1977, Kevin Tighe starred as Roy on Emergency! while his firefighter/paramedic partner was played by Randolph Mantooth.
In a 2010 interview with the Los Angeles Times, Tighe said opened up about their life-long friendship. "Randolph and I have stayed good friends," the actor said. "I was the best man at his wedding."
Now, it's been 50 years since the show premiered, and Tighe is 78 years old. Since his time on Emergency!, he's been on some other popular series, in movies, and on stage. Read on to find out more about the actor's today.
READ THIS NEXT: He Played Johnny on Emergency! See Randolph Mantooth Now at 77.
He was surprised to end up on Emergency!.
NBCUniversal Syndication StudiosWhen Tighe was cast of Emergency!, he had already performed in plays and in small parts in TV and movies. He was an extra in 1967's The Graduate and appeared on episodes of Adam-12 and Bonanza.
The up-and-coming performer was more focused on acting on stage at the time, but ended up with an audition for Emergency! anyway. “I came into [producer Jack Webb's] office and spoke four lines,” he told the Los Angeles Times. "They did a quick screen-test on me. I was scared to death. In two or three days, I was on the set and I am doing a pilot. I didn’t even know what a pilot was.”
He went on to more roles in popular shows.
Paramount PicturesAfter Emergency!, Tighe went on have roles in the movies Matewan, Roadhouse Newsies, What's Eating Gilbert Grape, I Am I, and more. He also appeared in episodes of shows, including ER, Freaks and Geeks, and The West Wing. Later, he played the recurring role of Anthony Cooper on Lost between 2005 and 2010. Tighe's most recent onscreen role was in a 2016 episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
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He acted alongside his daughter.
Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times via Getty ImagesTighe is married to Rebecca Fletcher, a visual artist, who does oil painting. He has a one daughter, Jennifer Tighe, from his first marriage. Jennifer is also an actor and has had roles in episodes of ER, Chicago Hope, Providence, NCIS, and more. In 2005, Tighe and Jennifer starred as a father and daughter in the play A Reckoning.
He's proud of Emergency!.
COZI TV / YouTubeIn his 2010 Los Angeles Times interview, Tighe was asked why Emergency! wasn't mentioned in his biography in the program for the play he was starring in at the time. He responded, "I feel a great deal of pride that I was able to be a paramedic." But, he added, "[I]t was something I did in my 20s. It didn’t require a lot of acting. It didn’t require a lot of great dialogue … I don’t list it in the program because it doesn’t really link with what I am doing now."
Tighe has gone on to participate in celebrating the series and its legacy, however. In 2o22, he appeared on COZI TV's 50th anniversary special for the show. He and Mantooth are producing a documentary together, Into the Unknown: The Paramedics’ Journey, clearly inspired by their time on the show. The two were photographed at the LA County Fire Museum while working on the movie earlier this year.
