tended more towards surreal plots and situations featuring Maynard as the central character rather than Dobie. Cast Main Dwayne Hickman as Dobie Gillis is a clean-cut teenager (later young adult) and unremarkable student whose young heart finds poetry and literature resonant. He aspires to have dates with all of the beautiful girls he pursues, despite the pressures of home life, high school, and later the military and college. Dobie also serves as the series narrator, relating his observations to the audience from in front of a statue of Rodin's The Thinker. Frank Faylen as Herbert T. Gillis, Dobie's old-fashioned, short-tempered, and gruff father who runs a small independent grocery store. Florida Friebus as Winifred "Winnie" Gillis is Dobie's doting mother, who tends to baby her son and critique her husband's parenting skills. Bob Denver as Maynard G. Krebs is Dobie's lazy and somewhat goofy best friend. Maynard is a would-be beatnik who shuns romance, authority figures, and work. Like Dobie does later, Maynard briefly joins the Army in season two between his high-school graduation and enrollment in college. Semiregulars Tuesday Weld as Thalia Menninger (season one) is a beautiful high-school classmate of Dobie's. Thalia is only willing to date Dobie when he has money or helps her in her schemes to make some for herself (with a father in poor health and a sister who married a layabout, Thalia sees it as her duty to bring some money into the family; she acknowledges that were this not a factor, she would date Dobie). Weld departed the series after the first season, later returning to make two guest appearances, as a somewhat chastened Thalia, once in season three and once in season four. Warren Beatty as Milton Armitage (season one) is a rich jock at Dobie's high school and a rival of Dobie's for Thalia's affections. Beatty quit the series midway through the first season. Sheila James as Zelda Gilroy is the smartest girl in Dobie's high school and college. Zelda is in love with the uninterested Dobie and schemes ways to get him to date and marry her. Steve Franken as Chatsworth Osborne, Jr., is a spoiled rich boy and a classmate of Dobie's in high school and college. Chatsworth assumed the role left vacant by the departure of Milton from the series. Like Dobie, Chatsworth also briefly joins the Army in season two between his high-school graduation and enrollment