Paul Bernard Benedict (September 17, 1938 – December 1, 2008)[1] was an American actor who made numerous appearances in television and films, beginning in 1965.

He was known for his roles as The Number Painter on the PBS children's show Sesame Street and as the English neighbor Harry Bentley on the CBS sitcom The Jeffersons.

[3] His oversized jaw and large nose were partially attributed to acromegaly; he was first diagnosed with it by an endocrinologist who saw Benedict in a theatrical production.

[4] Norman Lear cast Benedict as a Zen Buddhist in Cold Turkey, which was completed in late fall 1969 but not released until February 1971.

Perhaps his best-known movie role from that period was that of Reverend Lindquist in Sydney Pollack's 1972 film Jeremiah Johnson, starring Robert Redford.

He was the patiently eccentric butler in Dr. Necessiter's Gothic-castle apartment in The Man With Two Brains (1983), and had a short scene in the mockumentary This Is Spinal Tap (1984), playing Tucker Smitty Brown, the awkward hotel desk clerk who checks in the band.

He also made an appearance as the incorrectly assumed title character in the 1996 film Waiting for Guffman, another mockumentary involving many of the same writers and actors as This Is Spinal Tap.

In 2007, Benedict performed as "Hirst" in Harold Pinter's No Man's Land at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts.