As first executive director and then senior director of news special events at ABC, Savalas created and produced the "Your Voice of America" series. In the early 1950s, He was also an announcer for Voice of America's Greek Service. Savalas first acted on the TV show "Armstrong Circle Theater" (1959) and then on the series "The Witness" as Lucky Luciano, where actor Burt Lancaster "discovered" him. Savalas was cast opposite Lancaster's idealistic D.A. in the melodrama "The Young Savages" (1961). He moved on to play a string of heavies, winning acclaim and an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his performance as the sadistic Feto Gomez in "Birdman of Alcatraz" (1962). After portraying Pontius Pilate in "The Greatest Story Ever Told" (1965), he chose to remain completely bald and this signature look, somewhere between the comic and the ominous, stood him in good stead in the years that followed.
Savalas was memorable in "The Dirty Dozen" (1967), the seminal ensemble action film by director Robert Aldrich, and reappeared as a different character in two TV movie reprisals. His career was transformed with the lead role in the celebrated Abby Mann-scripted TV-movie "The Marcus Nelson Murders" (CBS, 1973) where the pop culture icon of Theo Kojak was born. Savalas polished his hard-boiled image to a brilliant sheen over the long run of "Kojak" (CBS, 1973-78). During those years, he co-bought racehorse Telly's Pop, recorded two albums, "Telly" (1974) and "Who Loves Ya, Baby" (1976) and directed and wrote the film "Beyond Reason" (1977). On the personal front, Savalas maintained a high-stakes gambler's life, crowded with lovers, children and ex-wives. After the very popular series ended, Savalas reprised the Kojak persona in several Kojak-based TV-movies, furthering his public canonization. One of Savalas' brothers, George Savalas (known professionally for a time simply as 'Demosthenes') played one of Detective Kojak's staff of police officers on "Kojak".