Hollywood Deaths - Catalogue Every Death in a Movie
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Those Who Have Gone Before
Hit television show creator Roy Huggins died of natural causes in Santa Monica, CA at the age of 87. In his lifetime Huggins created some of television's biggest hits including "Maverick" and "The Fugitive," His most successful television series was "The Fugitive," which ran from 1963 to 1967 and spawned a hit feature film in 1993 starring Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones, a feature sequel, and a revival television series in 2000. In the 1970s while at Universal Television, Huggins began his association with Stephen Cannell and together they created "The Rockford Files" and "City of Angels." Beginning in the mid-1950s at Warner Bros, where he helped the movie studio make its transition into television production, Huggins produced "Cheyenne," a western starring Clint Walker. The show, which debuted in 1955, was television's first hour-long series. In addition to "Maverick," Huggins created the western "Colt 45" and the hit detective show "77 Sunset Strip," which later spawned many television detective shows. He served as executive producer of "The Virginian" in its first year. He also created "Run for Your Life" and served as executive producer of "Alias Smith and Jones." Huggins co-created "The Rockford Files" and "City of Angels" with Stephen J. Cannell. Huggins also served as executive producer for the Cannell-created "Baretta," starring Robert Blake. In 1985, after Cannell formed his own studio, he lured Huggins out of retirement to produce "Hunter." | |
Western, Horror and War film actor John Agar died of complications from emphysema at the age of 81. Agar was best remembered for his marriage to child star Shirley Temple. The pair appeared together in two films, "Fort Apache" and "Adventure in Baltimore," and she gave birth to a daughter, Susan, in 1948. Troubled by Agar's excessive drinking and many flirtations, Shirley filed for divorce in 1949. Agar continued acting in Westerns such as "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" and "Along the Great Divide," and war movies "Sands of Iwo Jima" and "Breakthrough." His divorce from Temple and his alcoholism, which led to arrests for drunk driving, lowered his appeal. He later made schlock horror movies with titles such as "Revenge of the Creature," "Tarantula," "The Mole People," "Daughter of Dr. Jekyll" and "Journey to the Seventh Planet." John Wayne had appeared with him in "Fort Apache" and "Sands of Iwo Jima," and tried to revive Agar's career by casting him in "The Undefeated," "Chisum" and "Big Jake." Agar's last major film was the 1976 remake of "King Kong." | ||
Mexico's foremost movie legend, Maria Felix, renowned as a femme fatale throughout Latin America and the one-time lover of the painter Diego Rivera, died of heart failure on her 88th birthday. Striking for her long, dark wavy hair and pale complexion, Felix made her film debut in 1942 in El penon de las Animas (The Crag of the Souls) alongside popular Mexican actor Jorge Negrete, whom she married. Typically, Felix portrayed strong, silent women, endowed with intelligence and a voluptuous glamour. Although she shunned Hollywood, Felix's sultry beauty made her a screen idol in Latin America, France, Spain and Italy. One of the films of which she was most proud was French Cancan, directed by Jean Renoir. Felix last starred in La Generala, or The Lady General in 1970, after which she worked on a series of film projects but none reached fruition. She made 47 films in her career. | ||
Two-time NASCAR champion Buck Baker died at the age of 83. He was in the hospital for a procedure involving his pacemaker when he died. In his career, he won 46 Winston Cup races and 44 poles. He was the first back-to-back series champion, winning titles in 1956 and 1957. Buck Baker retired in 1976 and was inducted into the National Motorsports Press Association's Hall of Fame in 1982 and the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 1990. | ||
Damon Knight, a prolific science fiction writer and editor who helped transform pulp science fiction into a respectable genre, died of age-related causes.. He was 79. Knight published his first story in 1941, and went on to write 13 novels, beginning with "Hell's Pavement" in 1955, and more than 100 short stories. One short story, "To Serve Man," was adapted into a well-known TV episode of "The Twilight Zone." In it, aliens appear on earth and promise to end hunger and war, but their guidebook, "To Serve Man," is decoded and found to be a cookbook. This same episode was later parodied in one of the Simpsons' "Treehouse of Horror" specials. Although well known as a writer, Knight also was influential as a teacher, critic and organizer. He helped found the Science Fiction Writers of America and was editor of Orbit, a science fiction anthology series. Knight won the Hugo Award in 1956 for reviewing and a Grand Master Nebula Award in 1994. | ||
Rusty Burrell, a retired sheriff's deputy who later served as bailiff on the reality television show "The People's Court," died of lung cancer at his home in Rosemead. He was 76. Burrell, who spent 25 of his 31 years in law enforcement in the court system, was suffering from lung cancer. The white-haired lawman was a real-life bailiff during a number of high profile trials, including cult-killer Charles Manson and Patty Hearst, the newspaper heiress kidnapped by radicals who was later accused of joining their crimes. Burrell often worked with Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Joseph Wapner, who was chosen to preside over "The People's Court," dispensing stern lectures with his settlement decisions. When Burrell retired from the sheriff's department in 1981, he was hired to be the bailiff on the syndicated show Their tenure on the series ended in 1993, but the two friends reunited several years later to work on "Judge Wapner's Animal Court" on cable's Animal Planet network. | ||
Actor Robert Urich, who starred in television detective series "Vega$" and "Spenser: For Hire," died at 55 early on Tuesday after a long battle with cancer. Urich had a successful 30-year career in Hollywood, mostly on the small screen. He starred as private eye Dan Tanna in "Vega$," which ran on ABC from 1978 to 1981. He returned to the genre in 1985, playing another private eye in "Spenser: For Hire," which ABC aired until 1988. Urich won critical praise for playing the ex-Texas Ranger Jake Spoon who comes to a bad end in the mini-series "Lonesome Dove." He also won an Emmy in 1992 for his narration on a documentary "U-Boats: Terror on Our Shores." In 1998, he played the captain in a remake of "The Love Boat." He had recently co-starred in the short-lived NBC sitcom "Emeril." He earned his first television role in the 1973 comedy series "Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice." He also appeared in the TV series "S.W.A.T" before being cast as Peter Campbell in "Soap." Other television credits include: "Crossroads," "Vital Signs," and "It Had to Be You." Among his film credits are starring roles in Turk 182! with Timothy Hutton and Ice Pirates with Anjelica Houston. Urich announced in 1996 that he was suffering from synovial cell sarcoma, a rare cancer that attacks the body's joints. He underwent chemotherapy, radiation treatments and two operations in the mid-1990s to combat the cancer. After his bout with cancer, Urich became highly active in cancer research, with he and his wife establishing the Heather and Robert Urich Fund for Sarcoma Research to accelerate the pace of research into sarcoma. Earlier this year, Urich donated the proceeds from his appearance on the game show "Who Wants to be a Millionaire" to a fund at the University of Michigan, where he was treated for cancer. | ||
Popular UK TV star of the 1950's and 60's, Dave King, died after a short illness. He was 72. Dave King was one of the United Kingdom's most popular TV personalities of the 50's and 60's. He appeared in the gangster film The Long Good Friday and in Pennies from Heaven. His most recent TV role was in the soap "Coronation Street," as Clifford Duckworth. In 1955, the BBC gave him his own show, in which he performed sketches and spoofs of Hollywood films. He went on to have hits with Christmas and You, With All My Heart, High Hopes and The Story of My Life. Roles followed in some of the most popular UK TV series, including "The Sweeney," "The Professionals," "Bergerac," "Rumpole of the Bailey" and "Heartbeat." | ||
Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl, who sailed the Pacific on the Kon-Tiki balsa raft to back up a controversial theory that ancient peoples were skilled seafarers, died of cancer. He was 87. Heyerdahl sailed 4,300 miles from South America to Polynesia on an epic 101-day voyage on the Kon-Tiki in 1947 even though most scientists said he and his six-strong crew would sink and drown. He will remain Norway's greatest scientist, explorer and adventurer. Heyerdahl, who also crossed the Atlantic on a reed vessel built with primitive technology, died at a family home, at Colla Micheri near Alassio in northern Italy, after doctors gave up treatment for an incurable brain cancer. He crossed the Atlantic from Africa in 1970 on the Ra II reed boat, to show that ancient Egyptians might have beaten Columbus and the Vikings to America. In 1978, he sailed in the Middle East and Indian Ocean on the Tigris reed vessel, to mimic ancient trade routes. He wrote a dozen books including the one that the 1951 documentary Kon-Tiki was based. His book about that trip sold tens of millions of copies and his movie won an Academy Award for best documentary. Hyerdahl believed in maritime links between ancient civilizations. His Kon-Tiki trip was intended to support his theory that the South Sea Islands were settled by explorers from pre-Inca South America. The prevailing theory is that Polynesia was settled from Southeast Asia. Heyerdahl conceived his theory during a year spent on the Pacific island of Fatu Hiva in the Marquesas group. He noticed that stone figures of the Polynesian chief-god Tiki in the jungle were "remarkably like the monoliths left by extinct civilizations in South America." In the 1950s, he took more conventional expeditions to the Galapagos and to Easter Island. The latter trip produced "Aku-Aku," a 1957 book about the origins of the remote island's enormous stone heads. In 1995, he claimed to have found evidence that Christopher Columbus reached America in 1477, rather than 1492, as a teen-age crewman on a Danish-Portuguese expedition. In 1999, he claimed that Norseman Leif Eriksson sailed to North America a millennium earlier as a Christian missionary rather than as a Viking explorer as is generally believed. | ||
The lead singer of Alice in Chains has died of a possible drug overdose at the age of 34. He was discovered at his apartment on Friday April 19th, 2002 but it was reported that he had been dead for two weeks. Staley had battled heroin throughout his career, and often sang about his struggles. The band broke up briefly in 1994, frustrated by Staley's inability to stay clean. It broke up for good in 1996 after playing several opening dates on the KISS reunion tour. Two of its albums debuted at No. 1 on the U.S. pop charts, the 1994 acoustic EP "Jar of Flies" and the 1995 album "Alice in Chains." Hit singles included "Would?" which appeared on both "Dirt" and the soundtrack to writer/director Cameron Crowe's film "Singles," and "Rooster," a tune about Cantrell's Vietnam vet father. The band received four Grammy nominations. | ||
Linda Boreman, who starred as Linda Lovelace in the 1972 pornographic film Deep Throat and later became an anti-porn advocate from injuries she suffered in a car crash. She was 53. Boreman claimed her first husband forced her into pornography at gunpoint. They divorced in 1973. Their relationship disintegrated into a life of violence, rape, prostitution and pornography, according to her 1980 autobiography, "Ordeal" and her testimony before congressional committees investigating pornography. Boreman said she was never paid a penny for Deep Throat and her husband was only paid $1,250, though the film grossed a reported $600 million. After leaving the industry, she traveled the lecture circuit on a crusade against pornography, speaking at colleges and with prominent feminists. | ||
Taiwanese actor Lang Hsiung, who played a famous chef who lost his sense of taste but still cooked spectacular Sunday feasts for his three daughters in the hit 1994 arthouse film Eat, Drink, Man, Woman, who had diabetes and diseases of the liver and heart, died. He was 72. Lang, played leading and supporting roles in more than 100 Chinese-language films. But he didn't become famous worldwide until he was 60 and appeared in Oscar-winning Taiwanese director Ang Lee's movies. Lang played the father in Lee's A Wedding Banquet, a 1993 bittersweet comedy about traditional Taiwanese parents dealing with their son's homosexuality. He was the star of Oscar-nominated Eat, Drink, Man, Woman, a romantic-comedy about a retired widower searching for new meaning in his life as his adult daughters leave home. The actor also appeared in Lee's Oscar-winning martial arts fantasy, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, playing an imperial official and father of a young woman warrior, portrayed by Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi. | ||
Mexican film star Katy Jurado died at the age of 74. Jurado appeared in more than 20 Mexican films since the 1940s and earned the Mexican film industry's highest prize, the Ariel award, for her role in El Bruto. The actress also filmed movies in France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. In the United States in the 1950s she appeared in High Noon with Gary Cooper, and in Broken Lance, for which she received an Oscar nomination for best supporting actress. She was married to Ernest Borgnine from 1958 to 1963. | ||
Hollywood director John Frankenheimer in Los Angeles following a stroke. He was 72. He won four consecutive Emmy Awards in the 1990s for the television movies Against the Wall, The Burning Season, Andersonville, and George Wallace, which also received a Golden Globe award. In the 1960s, Frankenheimer's credits included the popular hits The Birdman of Alcatraz, The Manchurian Candidate, and Seven Days in May. Among Frankenheimer's other films were Reindeer Games, Ronin, Grand Prix, The Fixer, Black Sunday, and The French Connection II. | ||
Pioneering animator Ward Kimball died Monday at age 88. Kimball, a member of Walt Disney's trusted cadre of cartoon artists known as the "nine old men," died of natural causes at a hospital in Arcadia, a suburb northeast of Los Angeles. During a Disney career that stretched from 1934 until his retirement in 1973, Kimball animated or served as directing animator on such feature classics as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Cinderella and Alice in Wonderland. Two animated shorts he created for Disney, Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Bloom and It's Tough to be a Bird, won Academy Awards. But perhaps Kimball's most distinguished achievement was his development of Jiminy Cricket, the affable, top-hatted sidekick and conscience of the living puppet who longed to be a real boy in Disney's 1940 adaptation of Pinocchio. Kimball also was credited with animating the famed crow sequence in Dumbo and playing a key role in developing a more sophisticated cartoon design for Disney's signature character, Mickey Mouse, in 1938. | ||
Steiger, Oscar nominated for both On the Waterfront and The Pawnbroker before winning the statuette for In the Heat of the Night, succumbed to pneumonia and kidney failure at age 77. Steiger was known for a prodigious range that ran the gamut from fictional characters in Oklahoma! and Doctor Zhivago to a lengthy roster of real-life historical figures, among them Rasputin, Pontius Pilate, Napoleon, Ulysses S. Grant, Benito Mussolini, Al Capone and W.C. Fields. Along the way, he worked with such legendary writers and directors as Norman Jewison, John Frankenheimer, Arthur Miller, Elia Kazan, Sidney Lumet and Tim Burton. Besides Poitier and Brando, the veteran performer shared the screen with such Hollywood giants as Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, Sylvester Stallone and Jack Nicholson. He turned down the title role in Patton because he didn't want "to glorify war." The part went to George C. Scott, who won an Oscar for his portrayal of the hard-boiled World War II Army general. Steiger later called his refusal of the role his "dumbest career move." |
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