OC LIVE! : SPECIAL EVENT : ‘Loves’ of His Life : While ‘Dobie’ Remains Forever Young, Dwayne Hickman Racks Up Experience

When Dwayne Hickman published his autobiography last year, he called it “Forever Dobie,” and it fits: A youthful-looking 61, Hickman is still indelibly associated--in a way that series stars often are--with the character he played on TV. In his case, that was the clean-cut, girl-crazed title teen he portrayed from 1959 to 1963 on “The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis.”

He subtitled the book (which he co-wrote with his wife, Joan Roberts) “The Many Lives of Dwayne Hickman,” and that fits too. Though he’s best remembered as Dobie, there have been other roles as well, from film actor (starting at age 7) to a decade-long stint as CBS executive to director for such shows as “Designing Women” and “Duet.”

Then there’s fatherhood, subject of the newest book he and Roberts, 40ish, are writing. Hickman has a 31-year-old son from a previous marriage and a nearly 3-year-old boy with Roberts. The book’s title? “My Nerves Are Shot: Fatherhood the Second Time Around.”

But, always, there’s Dobie. More than 30 years later, the fan mail still comes, and Hickman continues to makes personal appearances. He flew to Texas this week for one, and on Sunday he’s the guest of honor at a tribute to the series at Rancho Santiago College in Santa Ana.

“The beat goes on. There’s as much interest [in ‘Dobie Gillis’] now as there ever was,” Hickman said in a phone interview from his home in Santa Monica. “When I did the show, I had no idea it would last all these years. I was just an actor making a living.”

That’s not to say that he isn’t proud of the show’s continuing hold on a generation’s memory--and its appeal to new viewers, thanks to a recent run on the cable TV channel Nickelodeon. “It was an extremely well-written show,” Hickman said. “Max Schulman [the series creator and main writer] was a novelist, and he raised TV writing to a new level. He captured the teen attitude. It was really the first show that dealt with kids from their point of view. Before that, you had shows like ‘Father Knows Best’ that dealt with kids from the parents’ point of view.”

In addition to its fresh viewpoint, the show had a breezy, upbeat quality and a steadfast refusal to take itself too seriously. It also had an unusual opening, in which Dobie would address the camera directly about his dilemma of the week (which you could bet had something to do with girls).

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Breaking the fourth wall was something that “Moonlighting” would get lots of credit for, but on “Dobie Gillis” they were doing it more than two decades earlier.

“They claim that it destroys the credibility and the reality of the characters,” Hickman said of some who warned against it at the time. “We were doing a kind of sketch comedy. ‘Dobie Gillis’ made no attempt to be reality. It was fun. Reality was the last thing we cared about.”

The lengthy opening monologues offered a special challenge to Hickman, who in the first season had to memorize each one--on a schedule that had them taping a new show each week for 38 weeks. In subsequent seasons, he used a TelePrompTer.

“I had an enormous part,” Hickman recalled. “All that dialogue, if you looked at it in a script, it would be page after page.” The monologues were “a very ambitious, adventuresome thing to do.”

Hickman followed his brother Darryl into the child actor business in 1940, working in films steadily through his teens and appearing on TV in the 1950s. “I was no Macaulay Culkin or Shirley Temple, but I was working,” Hickman said.

He started college and “was on my way to becoming an economist at Loyola” when he got a regular role on “The Bob Cummings Show” playing Cummings’ nephew. That led directly to his role on “Dobie Gillis,” which began filming in 1958.

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Hickman left that series a highly recognizable star but found it hard to get the kind of roles he hoped for. He did some ‘60s beach movies (“How to Stuff a Wild Bikini” was one) and had a supporting role in the comedy Western “Cat Ballou,” but pickings were generally slim.

He was almost 30 when “Dobie Gillis” was canceled and feeling ready to move beyond adolescent roles, but “I still looked very young,” Hickman said. What’s more, in the turbulent ‘60s, with its rise in anti-Establishment heroes, “the clean-cut type that I played kind of went out of style.”

Hickman worked in public relations for a time before taking an executive position at CBS as a supervisor of comedy series. Along the way, in addition to directing assignments, there have been two “Dobie Gillis” reunion movies, in 1977 and 1988, and other acting gigs, which he still takes when they come along. The acting bug, he said, is still there.

“I’ve been adaptable, which you have to be to survive, and I have survived,” Hickman said. “It’s kind of like being a U-boat commander. It’s a very dangerous profession, being an actor, and survivability is a big factor.”

Other guests scheduled to appear at Sunday’s tribute include Sheila James Kuehl, who played Zelda Gilroy, the one girl who chased Dobie (she’s now a California assemblywoman), and Steve Franken, who played Chatsworth Osborne Jr., the stuffed-shirt nemesis who succeeded Warren Beatty’s Milton Armitage.

Bob Denver, memorable as beatnik Maynard G. Krebs, will offer an on-video hello from his home in West Virginia. William Schallert, who played the teacher, Mr. Pomfritt, may also make an appearance, although he is rehearsing a play in Los Angeles.

Tuesday Weld, who stole Dobie’s heart as the beautiful but money-hungry Thalia Menninger in 1959 and 1960, is not scheduled to attend.

This will be Rancho Santiago College’s 13th annual TV tribute. Organizer Terry Bales last year saluted Paul Henning, creator of “The Beverly Hillbillies” and “Green Acres”; past events have highlighted such series as “Lassie” and “Batman” and such personalities as Steve Allen and Allen Funt.

The tribute will include clips from the show, reminiscences with the cast and a chance for the audience to ask questions. At a reception before the tribute, Hickman will sign copies of “Forever Dobie.”

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* What: Tribute to “The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis.”

* When: Sunday, 6 p.m. reception and 7 p.m. tribute.

* Where: Reception in the Fine Arts Lobby (C building) and tribute in Phillips Hall Theater, Rancho Santiago College, 17th and Bristol streets, Santa Ana.

* Whereabouts: Interstate 5 to 17th Street exit west. Continue just past Bristol Street and park on the left.

* Wherewithal: $10.

* Where to call: (714) 564-5600.