Reynolds played leading roles in a number of subsequent financial successes such as White Lightning (1973), The Longest Yard (1974), Smokey and the Bandit (1977) (which started a six-year box-office reign), Semi-Tough (1977), The End (1978), Hooper (1978), Starting Over (1979), Smokey and the Bandit II (1980), The Cannonball Run (1981), Sharky's Machine (1981), The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (1982) and Cannonball Run II (1984), several of which he directed.

Reynolds was voted the world's number one movie actor from 1978 to 1982 in the annual Top Ten Money Making Stars Poll, a record that he shares with Bing Crosby.

)[19] During 10th grade at Palm Beach High School, Reynolds was named First Team All State and All Southern as a fullback, and received multiple scholarship offers.

While at Florida State, he roomed with future college-football coach, broadcaster and analyst Lee Corso, and also became a brother of the Phi Delta Theta fraternity.

He cast him in the lead role based on having heard him read Shakespeare in class, resulting in his winning the 1956 Florida State Drama Award for his performance.

[26] After the tour, Reynolds returned to New York and enrolled in acting classes, along with Frank Gifford, Carol Lawrence, Red Buttons and Jan Murray.

"[24] After a botched improvisation in acting class, Reynolds briefly considered returning to Florida, but soon gained a part in a revival of Mister Roberts, in which Charlton Heston played the starring role.

[29] Reynolds began acting for television during the late 1950s, with guest roles on shows like Flight, M Squad, Schlitz Playhouse, The Lawless Years and Pony Express.

As he put it, "I played heavies in every series in town,"[31] appearing in episodes of Playhouse 90, Johnny Ringo, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Lock Up, The Blue Angels, Michael Shayne, Zane Grey Theater, The Aquanauts and The Brothers Brannagan.

"[46] Reynolds was considered for the role of Sonny Corleone in The Godfather, but Francis Ford Coppola's desire to cast James Caan in the part prevailed.

"[49] It was around this time when Reynolds also gained notoriety when he began a well-publicized relationship with Dinah Shore, who was 20 years his senior, and after he posed nude in the April 1972 issue of Cosmopolitan.

"[55] Reynolds starred in two big-budget fiascos: At Long Last Love (1975), a musical for Peter Bogdanovich, and Lucky Lady (1975), with Gene Hackman and Liza Minnelli.

[60] Reynolds had the biggest success of his career with the car-chase film Smokey and the Bandit (1977), directed by Hal Needham and co-starring Jackie Gleason, Jerry Reed and Sally Field.

Reynolds plays a jewel thief in Rough Cut (1980) produced by Merrick, who fired and rehired director Don Siegel during filming.

[63] For director Blake Edwards, Reynolds starred in The Man Who Loved Women (1983), a remake in English of François Truffaut's 1977 film L'Homme qui aimait les femmes, but it also failed.

Reynolds was injured badly during filming when he was hit in the jaw with a real chair instead of a breakaway prop, causing him excruciating chronic pain as well as a sharp weight loss that resulted in rumors circulating for years that he had AIDS.

Reynolds starred in the situation comedy television series, Evening Shade (1990–94) as former Pittsburgh Steelers player Woodward "Wood" Newton.

However, he gradually became more of a character actor – he had major support roles in Citizen Ruth (1996), an early work from Alexander Payne, and Striptease (1996) with Demi Moore.

Reynolds was a supporting actor in Frankenstein and Me (1996), Mad Dog Time (1996), The Cherokee Kid (1996), Meet Wally Sparks (1997) with Rodney Dangerfield, and Bean (1997) with Rowan Atkinson.

He also featured in Time of the Wolf (2002) and Hard Ground (2003), and had supporting roles in Johnson County War (2002) with Tom Berenger, and Miss Lettie and Me (2003) with Mary Tyler Moore.

In May 2018, Reynolds joined the cast of Quentin Tarantino's movie Once Upon a Time in Hollywood as George Spahn (an eighty year old blind man who rented out his ranch to Charles Manson), but he died before filming his scenes and was replaced by Bruce Dern (ironically, Leonardo DiCaprio's face is superimposed onto Burt's body from one of his guest spots on THE FBI).

Reynolds co-authored the 1997 children's book, Barkley Unleashed: A Pirate's Tail, a "whimsical tale [that] illustrates the importance of perseverance, the wonders of friendship and the power of imagination".

Along with music industry executive Buddy Killen, who produced his 1973 country and western/easy listening album Ask Me What I Am, Reynolds invested in Po' Folks, a Southern regional restaurant chain named after a Bill Anderson song.

[18] Reynolds suffered a steep decrease of his career earnings after the cancellation of Evening Shade, as his popularity waned due to bad publicity from his divorce from Loni Anderson, which became tabloid fodder.

His decrease of earnings as an actor plus the great expense of his divorce settlement, child support and alimony payments to Anderson caused a cash depletion by the mid-1990s.

[18] Subsequently, he filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, due in part to an extravagant lifestyle, a divorce from Loni Anderson and failed investments in restaurant chains.

[18] On August 16, 2011, Merrill Lynch Credit Corporation filed foreclosure papers, claiming Reynolds owed US$1.2 million on his home in Hobe Sound, Florida.

[111][112] His ex-wife Loni Anderson and their son Quinton held a private memorial service for Reynolds at a funeral home in North Palm Beach, Florida, on September 20.

Stephen Dalton wrote in The Hollywood Reporter that Reynolds "always seemed to embody an uncomplicated, undiluted, effortlessly likable strain of American masculinity that was driven much more by sunny mischief than angsty machismo.

"[126] Reynolds was nominated twice for the Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor In A Comedy Series in 1991 and 1992 for Evening Shade, winning in 1991 and losing to Craig T. Nelson in Coach the next year.