Donald Sutherland, one of the most-acclaimed Canadian actors of all time, has died. The star of M*A*S*H, Klute, and The Hunger Games was 88. Deadline reports that Sutherland passed away in Miami after a long illness.
Born in Saint John, New Brunswick on July 17, 1935, Sutherland was a correspondent for a local radio station in his teens. Wanting to pursue a career in acting, he left Canada in 1957 to study at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. He began to land small parts in British TV shows like The Avengers and The Saint, and in British horror movies from Hammer and Amicus, including Die! Die! My Darling! and Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors. He got his big break when he was cast as the slow-witted Vernon Pinkley in the all-star war film The Dirty Dozen, alongside Lee Marvin and Charles Bronson. The film was a hit, and Sutherland headed to Hollywood to further his film career.
An Iconic Star of the Big and Small Screens
The 1970s were a fruitful decade for Sutherland. In 1970, he starred in the seminal war comedy M*A*S*H as irreverent surgeon Hawkeye Pierce, and in the offbeat war heist film Kelly’s Heroes, starring alongside Clint Eastwood as anachronistic hippie tank commander Oddball. The next year, he gained more attention starring opposite Jane Fonda in the classic thriller Klute. Other highlights of the 1970s for Sutherland included Don’t Look Now, a Venice-set psychological horror film; Philip Kaufman‘s 1978 remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which features an iconic, bleak final shot of Sutherland; and the raunchy college comedy Animal House, which exposed Sutherland to a younger fan base. The 1980s and ’90s saw Sutherland star in a number of notable films, including Robert Redford’s directorial debut Ordinary People; Six Degrees of Separation, with a young Will Smith; and Ron Howard‘s Backdraft, in which Sutherland stole scenes from Robert De Niro as a pyromaniacial arsonist.
Always busy, Sutherland‘s most prominent role in recent years was the nefarious President Snow in The Hunger Games franchise. He recently starred in Ad Astra and Mr. Harrigan’s Phone, and had appeared as Judge Parker alongside David Oyelowo on Lawman: Bass Reeves. Despite his extensive filmography, Sutherland was never nominated for an Academy Award; he received an honorary Oscar in 2017. He was honored by his native country of Canada, where he was a member of the Order of Canada – the country’s highest civilian honor – and was featured on a Canada Post stamp last year.
Sutherland is survived by his third wife, Fancine Racette, and by five children. His son, Kiefer Sutherland, offered his remembrances on Twitter: “I personally think one of the most important actors in the history of film. Never daunted by a role, good, bad or ugly. He loved what he did and did what he loved, and one can never ask for more than that. A life well lived.”
via Collider