Christopher Mayer, the actor who known for playing the character of Vance Duke on the “Dukes of Hazzard,” died July 23rd at age 57. He was born in February of 1954 as George Charles Mayer.
He splashed onto the scene in 1980 as part of the ABC show, “Stunt Unlimited”, according to AOL. He was then cast as a replacement actor for the CBS series, “Dukes of Hazzard”, with Byron Cherry as Vance and Coy Duke.
The show was having trouble setting up contracts with the main characters, Tom Wopat and John Schneider at the time so they cast two “cousins” to keep the show going until the contracts were settled.
Mayer stayed on the show for 19 episodes but also starred in other TV series’ like “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine,” “Santa Barbara,” and “Weird Science.” He was also a part of the 1997 movie, “Liar Liar” with Jim Carrey.
He played T.J. Daniels in NBC’s Emmy award-winning series, “Santa Barbara.” Mayer remained on the show for over 100 episodes. After that he played in a slew of different TV shows and movies.
Mayer was born in New Jersey but settled in New York and had three daughters. He had a daughter, Ashley, from his first marriage with Teri Copley and then went on to marry Eileen Davidson in 1985. He later married Shauna Sullivan in 1986 and they had two daughters named Alexandra and Angelica.
He was planning to get married next month to his fiancée Catherine Irvine.
