Ned Beatty - Early Life

Early Life

Beatty was born in Louisville, Kentucky, the son of Margaret Fortney (née Lennis) and Charles William Beatty. He is not related to actor Warren Beatty. He has a sister, Mary Margaret. Before Beatty became an actor in 1947, he began singing in gospel and barbershop quartets in St. Matthews, Kentucky, and at his local church. He received a scholarship to sing in the a cappella choir at Transylvania University in Lexington, Kentucky; he attended but did not graduate.

In 1956, he made his stage debut at age 19, appearing in Wilderness Road, an outdoor-historical pageant located in Berea, Kentucky and he worked in the Louisville area through the mid-1960s, at the Clarksville Little Theater (Indiana) and the recently founded Actors Theater of Louisville. His time at the latter included a run as Willy Loman in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, in 1966. However, the first ten years of Beatty's career were spent at the Barter Theater in Abingdon, Virginia, which holds the distinction of being The State Theatre of Virginia.