Harold V. Goldstein, PhD, better known by his stage name Harold Gould, was an American actor, who, for Disney, played the role of Dietz in The Strongest Man in the World, Charles Gwynn in Gus, Miles Webber in The Golden Girls, Dr. Gustav Stumpfel in The Love Bug remake, Alan Coleman in Freaky Friday, and voiced an older Denahi in Brother Bear.
Gould was born to a Jewish family in Schenectady, New York. After graduating high school, he enrolled at Albany Teachers College and studied to become a social studies or English teacher. Soon, he enlisted in the United States Army during World War II and saw combat in France in a mortar battalion. After the war, Gould returned to school where he instead studied drama and graduated with a bachelor's degree in 1947. He later attended Cornell University to study drama and speech. Gould earned an M.A. degree in 1948 and a Ph.D. in theatre in 1953 from Cornell and also met his future wife, Lea Vernon. Upon graduation, Gould accepted a position at Randolph-Macon Woman's College in Lynchburg, Virginia, where he spent three years teaching and doing stage work. He made his professional theatre debut in 1955 as Thomas Jefferson in The Common Glory in Williamsburg. He moved to California where he tried professional acting and took side jobs as a part-time acting teacher at UCLA while looking for acting roles.
Gould made his film debut in 1962 in an uncredited role in Two for the Seesaw and a small part in The Coach. He would go on to appear in more films through the years, such as Marnie, The Satan Bug, The Yellow Canary, Inside Daisy Clover, Harper, The Arrangement, The Sting, Love and Death, The Front Page, Silent Movie, My Giant, Patch Adams, Stuart Little, and The Master of Disguise. His various television credits included The Virginian, Dennis the Menace, Dr. Kildare, Hazel, The Twilight Zone, The Donna Reed Show, Get Smart, Hogan's Heroes, Gunsmoke, I Dream Of Jeannie, Mission: Impossible, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Hawaii Five-O, Love, American Style, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Rhoda, Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, Touched by an Angel, and Judging Amy as well miniseries, like Washington: Behind Closed Doors and The Scarlett O'Hara War where he portrayed MGM mogul Louis B. Mayer which gained him an Emmy nomination.
His stage credits included on and off Broadway plays, such asGrown Ups, Fools, Mixed Emotions, Artist Descending a Staircase, and Visiting Mr. Green. He would win an Obie Award in 1969 for his work in The Increased Difficulty of Concentration, written by Václav Havel.
Gould died from prostate cancer on September 11, 2010.
