Chewin’ the fat with iron-willed ‘Laramie’ cowboy star Robert Fuller

Robert Fuller, star of 1970s NBC drama “Emergency!,” is point blank in a profile recalling his debt of gratitude to the Western genre which launched his television career in the late 1950s. Seen here leaning against a tree in an unbuttoned black shirt, striking actor Fuller contemplates his next career step during the waning days of “Laramie” in this circa 1963 candid. Image Credit: Silver Screen Collection / Getty Images

While eating some scrumptious lunch inside Universal Studios’ renowned green room commissary, illustrious scene stealing character actor Dan Duryea pointedly remarked to 25-year-old protégé Robert Fuller, “I know Laramie is your first series, and I’m gonna tell you something about money. I want you to save your money. Don’t be like all these actors and run right out and buy a new car, okay?”

Duryea’s shrewdly delivered advice was shockingly not heeded by the wet-behind-the-ears Fuller during that portending early summer of 1959, as the latter proudly drove into the Universal backlot a mere three days later sporting a brand new white Thunderbird with a blue interior.

For the past seven years, the veteran of the Korean War’s 19th Infantry Regiment had diligently taken acting classes with master thespian Richard Boone of future Have Gun — Will Travel fame, danced alongside Marilyn Monroe in the legendary “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend” production number from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, racked up uncredited bit parts in first-rate films like Gary Cooper’s Friendly Persuasion, Charlton Heston’s The Ten Commandments, and Gregory Peck’s The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, stunt doubled Jerry Lewis in The Delicate Delinquent, and toiled in two dozen grueling guest star turns during the Golden Age of Television…