Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sam McMurray

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. MBisanz ^talk 00:16, 4 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sam McMurray[edit]

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Not notable. No real assertion of notability. One obituary ref establishes that he is the stepson of an actress and the other is a simple directory listing. Velella ^{Velella Talk} 14:14, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. Being unrelated to Fred MacMurry is no reason for inclusion. Qworty (talk) 20:33, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Made quite a few movies, according to IMDb ([1]). Article is of bad quality, but not beyond salvation. The Banner _talk 13:15, 20 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Actors and filmmakers-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 14:37, 20 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Strong, obvious Keep, surely passes our guideline for actors, multiple notable roles that span from seventies till nowadays, just take a look at his "what links here" page [2]. Cavarrone (talk) 07:29, 22 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Gongshow ^Talk 12:44, 27 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - An early mention is in New York Times June 7, 1980. This January 23, 2007 press release mentions, "The in-depth segment also features current TV Actor Sam McMurray (over 150 appearances including Friends, King of Queens and The Tracy Ullman Show}." His mom was in acting.[3]. So was his stepmom, Lesley Woods.[4] In 2001, he was known for "The Sopranos," and "Raising Arizona"). There's not enough independent reliable source information for the topic to meet WP:GNG. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 14:59, 27 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

First, your analysis of sources is definitely minimal, we have more than 300 articles and several thousand of book sources about him. And it is not well clear on which basis you have chosen these sources, as we have definitely better sources about him, such as a biography by All Movie Guide ([5]), a portrait in the book "Guide to Character Actors" by Tara Ariano (that looks like significant coverage), an interview to Providence Journal or an interview to Monsters and Critics about his role in Lake Placid 2. Secondly, as he is an actor, we should not consider just GNG but also analyze if he played multiple significant roles in his career to pass WP:NACTOR standard. And he had, just to make some titles, a major role in The Tracey Ullman Show ([6]), a major role in Stand By Your Man ([7]), a major role in A League of Their Own([8]), a major role in Likely Suspects ([9]) a role of weight in Raising Arizona ([10]), a role of weight in Stone Cold ([11]), a major role in The Munsters' Scary Little Christmas ([12]) and so on, and the significance of these roles is verifiable by reliable sources. Cavarrone (talk) 18:58, 27 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Those sources might support a List of filmography for Sam McMurray Wikipedia article, but not a biography article topic for Sam McMurray. The source material needs to cover life events Sam McMurray using enough prose from which to write a Wikipedia biography article on the topic per WP:GNG to justify a biography article. List of filmography and a biography are two separate topics and a List of filmography meeting WP:GNG does not mean that a biography article topic for Sam McMurray meets WP:GNG as well. Given the amount of times he has appeared on TV and film, you would think some news story writer somewhere would wonder who is this person and what is his life story so as to produce third party reliable source coverage on this life. Yet, nothing has turned up. Sam McMurray's publicity people could easilty get Variety or other trade papers to write about McMurray. That would help his career, so it's not clear why his agent, publicity people, manager, etc. want to keep his life a secret. However, Wikipedia is not the place to generate such biography content. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 16:05, 3 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Your argument totally ignores our WP:NACTOR guideline, and that is a legitimate opinion, but just a personal opinion and goes against a well-established consensus in AfDs related to actors. And indeed we have several biographical sources, like the "All Movie Guide" biography or the book "Guide to Character Actors" (that is basically a printed encyclopedia), that, despite of you are keeping on ignore them, are significant, reliable sources, intellectually independent of each other and independent of the subject as prescribed by WP:BASIC criteria. We have already enough sources for a little stub, and probably more are available offline. It is not clear what kind of sources about McMurray's life you are asking for. Yes, he was never involved in sex scandals, he is not a disciple of Scientology nor he made talking about himself for gossip of any nature, and the main part of the coverage about him is about his work and his performances, so, is this a fault? Cavarrone (talk) 16:37, 3 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I closed this, but I missed the fact it had only been relisted today, so I'm going to reopen it - not least because someone else wants to give some input. However, at this time, this could only be closed as "delete", because the fact is that the nomination was on the grounds of notability. Notability is to be seen in lots of secondary, non-trivial, discussions of the subject (see WP:GNG). No one in the debate has indicated any evidence of such to refute the nomination. Uzma Gamal pretty much demolished the sources that have been provided.

If this is to be kept, someone needs to demonstrate that there are multiple sources engaging in non-trivial discussion of him and his roles. Showing he's been mentioned in lots of g-hits etc change nothing.--Scott Mac 17:37, 27 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. He appears to have had a career that is sufficiently significant to warrant an encyclopedia article. Coverage includes The Albany Herald (starring role in Likely Suspects), Los Angeles Daily News (starring role in same show, presumably), Beaver County Times (starring role in Baker's Dozen), Los Angeles Times (starring role in stage play Tom and Jerry), Chicago Tribune (major role in The Tracey Ullman Show), and there are books that cover him such as Friends: The Complete Guide and Hey! It's That Guy!: The Fametracker.com Guide to Character Actors. --Michig (talk) 18:10, 27 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
- "Friends: the Complete Guide"? Author seems to be "bada bing". This book is, in fact, apparently listed nowhere outside of google books [13] and looks suspiciously like a Wikipedia compilation.--Scott Mac 18:38, 27 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  - Yes that book looks dubious, but the other sources are easily sufficient to demonstrate that an encyclopedia article is appropriate. --Michig (talk) 18:56, 27 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    - Regarding that book specifically, it was published by PediaPress, so it is highly likely to be Wikipedia content. Chris857 (talk) 20:13, 27 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. [14] Wknight94 ^talk 19:07, 3 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.