We're big fans here of folks who do (or did) kid shows, so it's sad to hear of the passing of Frank Nastasi. Not having grown up in Detroit or New York, I never got the chance to see much of Mr. Nastasi's work but he had a pretty big credential on his list of credits: He was the guy who replaced Clyde Adler as the "other" cast member of the Soupy Sales program. As I discussed in this article, Soupy started his legendary show in Detroit, employing Clyde to play White Fang, Black Tooth, Pookie, Hippy and all the odd folks who came to the door. Clyde was the entire cast apart from Soupy himself.
Whenever Clyde was ill or on vacation, the void was filled by Frank Nastasi, who was then appearing on Wixie Wonderland, another kids' show produced at the station. Soupy and Clyde soon relocated to Los Angeles where their show went from local to national and became quite popular for a time. In 1965, Soupy had an offer to do a new version of it out of New York but Clyde didn't want to live back there and a new co-star was needed. Fortunately for Mr. Sales, Frank Nastasi had moved to Manhattan by that time and he quickly and efficiently assumed all the supporting roles. If you've seen the famous clip from Soupy's show of a pie fight with Frank Sinatra, Trini Lopez and Sammy Davis, Nastasi is the other guy in that sketch.
When he wasn't hurling shaving cream at the Soupman, Nastasi had a solid career as a character actor both on stage (including a role in Golden Boy opposite Sammy Davis) and on TV and in commercials. Here's an obit from a newspaper in Detroit where they still remember Frank fondly as a part of many childhoods. [Thanks to Mike Kuypers for the link.]