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thatcrazycajunVeteran British character actor and director Bob Hoskins has died at the age of 71 of what his publicist describes as pneumonia. The poor man had been suffering from Parkinson's disease for the past three years and had only two years ago announced his retirement from acting due to the illness. CNN's website has an obit here with a wonderful picture gallery of some of Bob's best roles—including one or two about which I'd had no idea until now (example: Enemy at the Gates, in which he played the late former Soviet Union leader Nikita Khrushchev under some amazing heavy makeup).
If he'd never done anything more than breathe life into a hard-bitten Hollywood gumshoe named Eddie Valiant in Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (arguably the most amazing combo of live-action and animation since another film by the Disney studio, Fantasia, at the time), I'd consider him worth remembering. But he did so many other wonderful bits of stage, film and TV work over 3.5 decades...and no matter what his look, his accent, his lines or his behavior, when his balding mug was on screen, you just simply couldn't take your eyes off it. Even in a minor role like the obnoxious screenwriter Stanley Gould in a 1986 bit of cinematic fluff called Sweet Liberty, directed by and starring Alan Alda, Bob made the most of it, committing gleeful, shameless grand larceny on every scene he was in...and you invariably enjoyed the living daylights out of watching him do it.
Deepest sympathies to his two wives and four children, the rest of his family, friends, colleagues, co-workers and his many, many fans, in whose number Your Humble proudly counts himself. Thank you, sir, for a lifetime of hard work keeping us all entertained...and I hope your soul is at peace and free of pain at last.
If he'd never done anything more than breathe life into a hard-bitten Hollywood gumshoe named Eddie Valiant in Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (arguably the most amazing combo of live-action and animation since another film by the Disney studio, Fantasia, at the time), I'd consider him worth remembering. But he did so many other wonderful bits of stage, film and TV work over 3.5 decades...and no matter what his look, his accent, his lines or his behavior, when his balding mug was on screen, you just simply couldn't take your eyes off it. Even in a minor role like the obnoxious screenwriter Stanley Gould in a 1986 bit of cinematic fluff called Sweet Liberty, directed by and starring Alan Alda, Bob made the most of it, committing gleeful, shameless grand larceny on every scene he was in...and you invariably enjoyed the living daylights out of watching him do it.
Deepest sympathies to his two wives and four children, the rest of his family, friends, colleagues, co-workers and his many, many fans, in whose number Your Humble proudly counts himself. Thank you, sir, for a lifetime of hard work keeping us all entertained...and I hope your soul is at peace and free of pain at last.
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Date: 2014-05-01 09:27 am (UTC)1. Defy authority;
2. Destroy property;
3. Take off clothes!