ured with that production was well.

He started out as a hotel bellman in Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? before taking over the role of George MacCauley that was originated by Orson Bean.

According to his son, when gangsters in the 1950s threatened to break Matthau's legs because he owned them money, Sheiner lent him hundreds of dollars to get him out of trouble. Sheiner eventually got his money back (Matthau's wife told him years later not everybody did).

On television, Sheiner played the doctor on the submarine in the memorable 1963 Twilight Zone episode  The Thirty-Fathom Grave  and was the boss of Diana Rigg's fashion designer on the 1973 NBC sitcom Diana (Barbara Barrie portrayed his wife).

He showed up on dozens of other shows, from Studio One, Perry Mason, The Detectives, Combat!, Mr. Novak, The Man From U.N.C.L.E., The Fugitive, The Big Valley, Hawaii Five-O and Mission: Impossible to Mannix, Columbo, Planet of the Apes, Medical Center, The Six Million Dollar Man, Vega$, Quincy, M.E., The Fall Guy and, for his last onscreen credit in 1988, Murder, She Wrote.

Meanwhile, his film résumé included A Man Called Gannon (1968), Winning (1969), They Call Me Mister Tibbs! (1970), Battle Creek Brawl (1980) and Blue Thunder (1983).

Sheiner served for years on SAG's Wages and Working Conditions committee and on the Film Academy committee that helps select international films for Oscar consideration, and his best friend was Lost in Space star Jonathan Harris.

In addition to his son, survivors include his wife, Mary-David Sheiner, a TV writer whose mother was Mary C. McCall Jr., the first woman president of the WGA, then known as the Screen Writers Guild; his daughter, Kate; and his granddaughter, Liv.

Donations in his memory can be made to the Motion Picture   Television Fund.