Richard Dawson was born Colin Lionel Emm on Nov. 20, 1932, in Gosport, Hampshire, England. His father was a furniture mover, and his mother occasionally played cards to win extra money for food. In the 2010 interview, he said that he had no early ambition to be an entertainer but that he did have a knack for making people laugh. He was lured to his first theater audition, he said, by the prospect of meeting girls.

After an early career as a comedian in England, he moved to the United States with his first wife, Diana Dors, an actress known as the “British Marilyn Monroe.” They divorced in 1966, and Ms. Dors died in 1984. Mr. Dawson gained initial fame in the 1960s playing Cpl. Peter Newkirk, a con man, forger and pickpocket, in the CBS series “Hogan’s Heroes,” a popular comedy about a Nazi prison camp where the inmates routinely outwit their bumbling captors. He also had stints on “The New Dick Van Dyke Show” and “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In.”

In 1987 Mr. Dawson played alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger in the dystopian thriller “The Running Man.” In the film he plays a dark caricature of himself, the host of a game show in which convicted felons must outrun bands of deadly hunters for a chance to win their freedom.

Mr. Dawson is survived by his wife, Gretchen, whom he met when she was a contestant on “Family Feud”; their daughter, Shannon Nicole; two sons from his first marriage, Gary and Mark; and four grandchildren.

Asked in the 2010 interview how he would want the world to remember him, he said, as a nice guy.

“You wouldn’t want to move if you sat next to me on the bus,” he said. “Or maybe you would.”