Veteran character actor John Beasley, who appeared in the TV drama ‘Everwood,’ dies at 79

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — John Beasley, the veteran character actor who played a kindly school bus driver on the TV drama “Everwood” and appeared in dozens of films dating back to the 1980s, has died.  He was 79. His manager, Don Spradlin, says Beasley died Tuesday after a “brief and unexpected illness” in his hometown of Omaha. Beasley played an assistant coach in the 1993 football film “Rudy” and a retired preacher in 1997’s “The Apostle,” co-starring and directed by Robert Duvall. On TV, Beasley was the father of Cedric the Entertainer in the TV Land comedy “The Soul Man.” For more than a dozen years, he ran the John Beasley Theater and Workshop in Omaha.