In Memoriam

Nelson A. Bradshaw, 74

An Actor’s Final Curtain

Nelson Allen Bradshaw’s more than 10-year fight against Parkinson’s disease with Lewy body dementia (LBD) ended on December 31, 2021. Nelson was born in Redwood City, California, on April 14, 1947 to Obeda Rogers and Robert P. Bradshaw and was raised by his father. Nelson early discovered a love of acting, appearing in productions at Sequoia High School (Class of ’65) under the direction of Ray Doherty. He was also editor of the school paper. For a brief time as a young man he was a cub reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle.

He joined the East West Players in Los Angeles in the early 1970s. One of the productions he performed in with EWP was In the Jungle of Cities. He was one of the initial members of EWP’s newly formed subgroup, the Total Theatre Ensemble, which performed in schools.

He worked in soap operas and had small parts in movies, such as a popcorn-eating theater patron in The World According to Garp and as a juror in the 1975 made-for-television film, Guilty or Innocent: The Sam Sheppard Murder Case. The summer of 1979 found him performing at the Shawnee Summer Theatre in Indiana.