June 20 (UPI) -- Gailard Sartain, an actor who starred in Hee Haw and Fried Green Tomatoes, died Tuesday. He was 78.
The Church Studio, an Oklahoma recording studio where Sartain's wife, Mary Jo, volunteers, announced his death Friday.
Deadline said Sartain was battling an unspecified illness, but a specific cause of death was not shared.
"I knew he wasn't in good health and hadn't been for a while," fellow Hee Haw alum Victoria Hallman told TMZ. "We always fool ourselves that people will hang on."
In a tribute on Instagram, Church Studio said Sartain was "an extraordinary actor, artist and comedian."
He began working on the variety show Hee Haw in 1972, and his other credits include Texas Ranger, Nashville, The Buddy Holly Story, The Outsiders, Fried Green Tomatoes, The Big Easy and The Hollywood Knights.
