Bob Newhart, the famous comedian and actor, died at the age of 94.

Bob Newhart, 94, a popular stand-up comedian, died Thursday morning. He was well recognized for his dry, deadpan wit and cherished roles in two highly acclaimed CBS sitcoms.

A longtime Newhart representative issued a statement confirming the TV icon’s death and adding that Newhart died at his Los Angeles home after “a series of short illnesses.”

Newhart, a former accountant, had a significant impact on humour with his subtle delivery and unassuming manner. His breakout album, The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart, published in 1960, was a huge success, featuring his trademark one-sided dialogue.

The album was a tremendous commercial success and received Grammy awards. A critic once described him as “a twentieth-century Mark Twain in Brooks Brother’s attire.”

Newhart incorporated his mild stammer and deadpan delivery early in his persona, which helped him build a successful career. Even while he had his fair share of funny lines on TV, he frequently adopted the Jack Benny character as the “straight man,” allowing the occasionally eccentric cast members around him to steal the spotlight. However, Newhart stated that “Jack Benny did not affect me,” identifying George Gobel, Bob and Ray as his primary sources of acting and creative inspiration.

He would frequently portray one part of a phone conversation throughout his performances. In the film “King Kong,” a rookie security guard at the Empire State Building seeks advice on how to deal with an ape “between 18 and 19 storeys up, depending on whether there’s a 13th floor or not.”

He informs his supervisor that he has looked “under ‘ape’ and ‘ape’s toes'” in the guard manual. Defusing a Bomb (in which an anxious police commander shows a novice patrolman how to detonate a live shell discovered on the beach), The Driving Instructor, Mrs. Grace L. Ferguson Airline (and Storm Door Company), “Introducing Tobacco to Civilization.” Abraham Lincoln vs. Madison Avenue, “Ledge Psychology,” “The Krushchev Landing Rehearsal,”  “The Retirement Party,” and “A Friend with.

Successful sitcoms include The Bob Newhart Show in the 1970s and Newhart in the 1980s. In the previous season, Newhart portrayed a psychologist who gently handled issues such as mental health and the growing LGBT rights movement. In his later years, Newhart appeared in Elf and The Big Bang Theory, which introduced him to generations X, Y, and Z.

He became a television star in the 1970s, playing as Dr. Bob Hartley on NBC’s The Bob Newhart Show from 1972 until 1978. From 1982 until 1990, he starred in the CBS sitcom Newhart as Dick Loudon, an author who commutes with his wife from New York City to Vermont to run a historic inn.

Later, Newhart received two Emmy nominations: one in 2003 for his role as a blind librarian on ER, and another in 2008 for the television film The Curse of the Judas Chalice. In addition to three guest appearances on The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson between 1966 and 1992, Newhart played himself in a 1996 episode of The Simpsons and hosted episodes of Saturday Night Live in 1980 and 1995. In addition, he played himself in a 2002 episode of Everybody Loves Raymond, appeared five times on the Leno version between 1998 and 2009, and participated in a complex prank at the 2006 Emmy Awards, which Conan O’Brien hosted, before co-presenting the comedy series award.

His book, I Shouldn’t Even Be Doing This, came out in 2006. It includes funny anecdotes and memories. The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame inducted Newhart in 1993. He received the second Mark Twain Prize for Humour from the Kennedy Center in 2002. In 2007, the Library of Congress added The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart to the National Recording Registry as one of 25 recordings.

The Newhart series finale is undoubtedly Newhart’s best-known work. Some consider this to be one of the most memorable moments in television history. A visiting Japanese entrepreneur purchases the entire town and transforms it into a huge golf course and leisure complex. His children, Robert Jr., Timothy, Courtney, and Jennifer, survive him, as do ten grandchildren. Ginnie, his wife, died the previous year.

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