Adam West was born William West Anderson on September 19, 1928 in Walla Walla, Washington. His father, Otto Anderson (1903–1984) was a farmer; and his mother, Audrey Volenne (née Speer; 1906–1969) was an opera singer and concert pianist who left her Hollywood dreams to care for her family. Following her example, West told his father as a young man that he intended to go to Hollywood after completing school. He moved to Seattle with his mother when he was 15, following his parents’ divorce.

West was married three times. His first marriage was to his college girlfriend Billie Lou Yeager in 1950. The couple divorced six years later. In 1957 he married Cook Island dancer Ngatokorua Frisbie Dawson, part of the Puka Puka Otea in Hawaii. They had two children before their divorce in 1962. West then married Marcelle Tagand Lear in November 1970. They had two children and remained together for more than 46 years, until West’s death. West also had two step-children.

He appeared in the film The Young Philadelphians which starred Paul Newman. He had guest-star roles in a number of television Westerns. On three Warner Bros. westerns which aired on ABC—Sugarfoot, Colt .45, and Lawman—West played the role of Doc Holliday, the frontier dentist and gunfighter. West also appeared playing different characters in two episodes of Maverick opposite James Garner: “Two Tickets to Ten Strike” and “A Fellow’s Brother” in 1958.

While in Hawaii, West was picked for a role as the sidekick on a local TV program, The Kini Popo Show, which also featured a chimp named Peaches. West later took over as host of the show. In 1959, West moved with his wife and two children to Hollywood, where he took the stage name Adam West.

On January 10, 1961, West appeared as a young, ambitious deputy who foolishly confronts a gunfighter named Clay Jackson, portrayed by Jock Mahoney, in the episode “The Man from Kansas” of the NBC Western series Laramie. He played Christopher Rolf in the episode “Stopover” of ABC’s The Rifleman, which aired on April 25, 1961.

West made two guest appearances on Perry Mason in 1961 and 1962. His first role was as small-town journalist Dan Southern in “The Case of the Barefaced Witness”. His other role was as folk singer Pete Norland in “The Case of the Bogus Books”.

He made a brief appearance in the 1963 film Soldier in the Rain starring Jackie Gleason and Steve McQueen, and starred as Colonel Dan McCready, the ill-fated mission commander of Mars Gravity Probe 1 in the 1964 film Robinson Crusoe on Mars. That same year he was cast alongside William Shatner in the pilot for the proposed series Alexander the Great, playing Cleander to Shatner’s Alexander. The series was not picked up and the pilot wasn’t broadcast until 1968 when it was repackaged as a TV movie to capitalize on West and Shatner’s later fame. West was apparently unsurprised by the rejection, later noting that “It turned out to be one of the worst scripts I have ever read and it was one of the worst things I’ve ever done.”

In 1965, he was cast in the comedy Western The Outlaws Is Coming, the last feature film starring The Three Stooges.

The popular campy show ran on ABC from 1966 to 1968; a feature-length film version directed by Leslie H. Martinson was released in 1966.

In 1966, West released a novelty song Miranda as his Batman character.

In 1970, West was considered for the role of James Bond by producer Albert Broccoli for the film Diamonds Are Forever.

For a time, West made a living from personal appearances as Batman. In 1974, when Ward and Craig reprised their Batman roles for a TV public-service announcement about equal pay for women, West did not participate; instead, Dick Gautier appeared as Batman. One of West’s more memorable Batman appearances, after the series had ended, was with the Memphis-based United States Wrestling Association, where he engaged in a war of words with Jerry “The King” Lawler while wearing the cowl and a tracksuit, and even name-dropping Spider-Man.

West often reprised his role as Batman/Bruce Wayne, first in the short-lived animated series The New Adventures of Batman, and in other shows such as The Batman/Tarzan Adventure Hour, Tarzan and the Super 7, and The Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians (succeeding Olan Soule in the role). In 1979, West once again donned the Batsuit for the live-action TV special Legends of the Superheroes. In 1985, DC Comics named West as one of the honorees in the company’s 50th-anniversary publication Fifty Who Made DC Great for his work on the Batman series.

He did guest shots on the television series; Maverick, Diagnosis: Murder, Love, American Style, Bonanza, The Big Valley, Night Gallery, Alias Smith and Jones, Mannix, Emergency!, Alice, Police Woman, Operation Petticoat, The American Girls, Vega$, Big Shamus, Little Shamus, Laverne & Shirley, Bewitched, Fantasy Island, The Love Boat, Hart to Hart, Zorro, The King of Queens, and George Lopez. West was also in an episode of Bonanza that supposedly never aired until reruns were shown and he made several guest appearances as himself on Family Feud. In 1986, he starred in the comedy police series titled The Last Precinct.

During the 1990s, West’s status as a pop culture icon led to appearances as himself in the film Drop Dead Gorgeous and in several TV series, including NewsRadio, Murphy Brown, The Adventures of Pete & Pete, The Ben Stiller Show, and The Drew Carey Show. He notably appeared as “Dr. Wayne” in the 1990 Zorro episode “The Wizard”, even being shown Zorro’s “secret cave” headquarters. In 1991, he starred in the pilot episode of Lookwell, in which he portrayed a has-been TV action hero who falsely believes he can solve mysteries in real life. The pilot, written by Conan O’Brien and Robert Smigel in their pre-Late Night period, aired on NBC that summer, but was not picked up as a series. It was later broadcast on the Trio channel, under the “Brilliant But Cancelled” block. In 1994, West played a non-comedic role as the father of Peter Weller’s character in the Michael Tolkin film The New Age.

West was considered to play Thomas Wayne, Bruce Wayne’s father, in Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman film. Originally, he wanted to play Batman. West never appeared in any of the theatrically released post-1960s Batman franchise motion pictures and, to date, neither has Burt Ward, who played Robin in the TV series. He did, however, serve as a voice actor in various Batman-related animated series and films. West appeared in a 1992 episode, “Beware the Gray Ghost”, of Batman: The Animated Series on Fox, as Simon Trent, a washed-up actor who used to play a superhero in a TV series called The Gray Ghost and who now has difficulty finding work. He had a recurring role as the voice of Mayor Grange in the 2004-2008 WB animated series The Batman. West was the voice of Batman in the 2005 CGI-animated short film Batman: New Times. He co-starred with Mark Hamill, who vocally portrayed The Joker and had originally played the role on Batman: The Animated Series. West also voiced Thomas Wayne in a 2010 episode, “Chill of the Night!”, of the cartoon series Batman: The Brave and the Bold.

In 1994, West, with Jeff Rovin, wrote his autobiography, Back to the Batcave published by Berkeley Books. In 1997, Virgin Interactive released the gambling simulation game Golden Nugget. West acted in the video cut scenes of the “Chaos Mystery” storyline subgame. In 2001, he played the super-villain Breathtaker on the short-lived television series Black Scorpion.

In 1997, West appeared in a national television advertising campaign for Ziebart.

From 2000, West made regular appearances on the animated series Family Guy, on which he played Mayor Adam West, the lunatic mayor of Quahog, Rhode Island. His role brought West a new wave of popularity post-Batman, and lead writer Seth MacFarlane claims to have gone out of his way to avoid typecasting West by deliberately not making any references to Batman.

In 2003, West and Burt Ward starred in the television movie Return to the Batcave: The Misadventures of Adam and Burt, alongside Frank Gorshin, Julie Newmar, and Lee Meriwether. Jack Brewer portrayed West in flashbacks to the production of Batman. In 2005, West appeared in the CBS show The King of Queens. In the episode, Spence first asks Lou Ferrigno to go to a sci-fi convention, but when Spence meets West (playing himself), he leaves Ferrigno and asks West to come with him. He appears prominently in the 2006 video for California band STEFY’s song “Chelsea” as “Judge Adam West”, presiding over the courtroom scene.

In 2007, West played an attorney for Benny on the show George Lopez, and he starred as “The Boss” in the movie comedy Sexina: Popstar PI. Following the release of a Batman game, a host of the show X-Play visited West on the show. In 2009, West played himself in the episode “Apollo, Apollo” of 30 Rock.

In 2010, a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars was dedicated to him. West received the 2,468th star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on April 5, 2012. His star is located at 6764 Hollywood Boulevard in front of the Guinness Museum in Hollywood, California.

Some of his last voice-over performances were playing the role of Uncle Art in the Disney Animation film Meet the Robinsons, and voicing the young Mermaid Man (along with Burt Ward, who voiced the young Barnacle Boy) in the cartoon show SpongeBob SquarePants, in the episode “Back to the Past” in 2010.

He was interviewed in 2013 on the PBS series called Pioneers of Television in the season-three episode called “Superheroes”. Also in 2013, he was the subject of the documentary Starring Adam West.

West is among the interview subjects in Superheroes: A Never-Ending Battle, a three-hour documentary narrated by Liev Schreiber that premiered on PBS in October 2013.

In November 2014, West voiced himself, the 1960s version of Batman, and the Gray Ghost in the video game Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham.

In February 2016, West guest-starred as himself on the 200th episode of The Big Bang Theory.

In 2016 West was the voice of TV’s Batman for the Batman ’66 pinball game produced by Stern Pinball Incorporated.

In January 2017, West appeared on the British comedy panel show “Through the Keyhole” in which viewers and panellists looked around West’s Los Angeles home by video.

Walla Walla, Washington, Adam West’s hometown, officially celebrates its annual “Adam West Day” on September 19, with the first one celebrated in 2017.

West died from leukemia, in Los Angeles, California, on June 9, 2017. After his death, West’s former Batman co-star and longtime friend, Burt Ward, released a statement; “This is a terribly unexpected loss of my lifelong friend, I will forever miss him. There are several fine actors who have portrayed Batman in films. In my eyes, there was only one real Batman that is and always will be Adam West. He was truly the Bright Knight.” Batman: The Animated Series actor Kevin Conroy (who performed alongside West in the episode “Beware the Gray Ghost”) said “Adam West was an incredibly good, generous actor. Loved working with him as Gray Ghost. A true gentleman”.

On June 15, 2017, Los Angeles projected the Bat-Signal on City Hall as a tribute to West, and in his hometown of Walla Walla, WA, the Bat-Signal was shone upon the city’s landmark Whitman Tower.