Adam Kennedy; Actor Also Wrote Novels and Was Acclaimed Painter

Adam Kennedy, an actor who wrote novels and an artist whose works were shown in exhibitions in the United States and Europe, has died.

His friend and former agent, Betsy Nolan, said Kennedy died Thursday at his Kent, Conn., home of a heart attack. He was 75.

In 1952 he was hailed in Paris as that city’s most outstanding American painter.

As an actor he appeared on Broadway and European stages, and at his death had 300 television credits, including leads in “The Doctors” and “The Californians.”

His other TV credits included “Gunsmoke,” “Playhouse 90” and “Studio One.”

He wrote some of the first of his 20 novels in the late 1960s under the pseudonym John Redgate. Among his better-known books are “The Killing Season” (which won the 1967 Mystery Writers’ Award), “The Domino Principle” (for which he also wrote the screenplay), “Maggie D.: A Sexual History,” “Somebody Else’s Wife,” “Just Like Humphrey Bogart” and “Love Song.”

Kennedy also acted in feature films, including “The Court Martial of Billy Mitchell” and “Until They Sail.”