Hello There, Guest! (LoginRegister)

      
Post Reply 
Durning, king of character actors, dies in NYC
Author Message
Bookmark and Share
ctipton Offline
Jersey Retired
Jersey Retired

Posts: 32,482
Joined: Mar 2004
Reputation: 140
I Root For: UC and the Reds
Location: Cincinnati West Side

DonatorsDonators
Post: #1
Durning, king of character actors, dies in NYC
Durning, king of character actors, dies in NYC

Published - Dec 25 2012 03:01PM EST

BOB THOMAS, Associated Press

[Image: 628x471.jpg]
FILE - In this Saturday, March 3, 1984 file photo, from left, actors Charles Durning, Eliott Gould and Screen Actors Guild President Ed Asner take a break before the filming of the 50th Anniversary Special celebrating the guild in Santa Monica, Calif. Durning, the two-time Oscar nominee who was dubbed the king of the character actors for his skill in playing everything from a Nazi colonel to the pope, died Monday, Dec. 24, 2012 at his home in New York City. He was 89. Photo: Heung Shing Liu / AP

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Charles Durning grew up in poverty, lost five of his nine siblings to disease, barely lived through D-Day and was taken prisoner at the Battle of the Bulge.

His hard life and wartime trauma provided the basis for a prolific 50-year career as a consummate Oscar-nominated character actor, playing everyone from a Nazi colonel to the pope to Dustin Hoffman's would-be suitor in "Tootsie."

Durning, who died Monday at age 89 in New York, got his start as an usher at a burlesque theater in Buffalo, N.Y. When one of the comedians showed up too drunk to go on, Durning took his place. He would recall years later that he was hooked as soon as he heard the audience laughing.

He told The Associated Press in 2008 that he had no plans to stop working. "They're going to carry me out, if I go," he said.

Durning's longtime agent and friend, Judith Moss, told The Associated Press that he died of natural causes in his home in the borough of Manhattan.

Although he portrayed everyone from blustery public officials to comic foils to put-upon everymen, Durning may be best remembered by movie audiences for his Oscar-nominated, over-the-top role as a comically corrupt governor in 1982's "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas."

Many critics marveled that such a heavyset man could be so nimble in the film's show-stopping song-and-dance number, not realizing Durning had been a dance instructor early in his career. Indeed, he had met his first wife, Carol, when both worked at a dance studio.

The year after "Best Little Whorehouse," Durning received another Oscar nomination, for his portrayal of a bumbling Nazi officer in Mel Brooks' "To Be or Not to Be." He was also nominated for a Golden Globe as the harried police lieutenant in 1975's "Dog Day Afternoon."

He won a Golden Globe as best supporting TV actor in 1991 for his portrayal of John "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald in the TV film "The Kennedys of Massachusetts" and a Tony in 1990 as Big Daddy in the Broadway revival of "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof."

Durning had begun his career on stage, getting his first big break when theatrical producer Joseph Papp hired him for the New York Shakespeare Festival.

He went on to work regularly, if fairly anonymously, through the 1960s until his breakout role as a small town mayor in the Pulitzer- and Tony Award-winning play "That Championship Season" in 1972.

He quickly made an impression on movie audiences the following year as the crooked cop stalking con men Paul Newman and Robert Redford in the Oscar-winning comedy "The Sting."

Dozens of notable portrayals followed. He was the would-be suitor of Dustin Hoffman, posing as a female soap opera star in "Tootsie;" the infamous seller of frog legs in "The Muppet Movie;" and Chief Brandon in Warren Beatty's "Dick Tracy." He played Santa Claus in four different movies made for television and was the pope in the TV film "I Would be Called John: Pope John XXIII."

"I never turned down anything and never argued with any producer or director," Durning told The Associated Press in 2008, when he was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Other films included "The Front Page," ''The Hindenburg," ''Breakheart Pass," ''North Dallas Forty," ''Starting Over," ''Tough Guys," ''Home for the Holidays," ''Spy Hard" and 'O Brother Where Art Thou?"

Durning also did well in television as a featured performer as well as a guest star. He appeared in the short-lived series "The Cop and the Kid" (1975), "Eye to Eye" (1985) and "First Monday" (2002) as well as the four-season "Evening Shade" in the 1990s.

"If I'm not in a part, I drive my wife crazy," he acknowledged during a 1997 interview. "I'll go downstairs to get the mail, and when I come back I'll say, 'Any calls for me?'"

Durning's rugged early life provided ample material on which to base his later portrayals. He was born into an Irish family of 10 children in 1923, in Highland Falls, N.Y., a town near West Point. His father was unable to work, having lost a leg and been gassed during World War I, so his mother supported the family by washing the uniforms of West Point cadets.

The younger Durning himself would barely survive World War II.

He was among the first wave of U.S. soldiers to land at Normandy during the D-Day invasion and the only member of his Army unit to survive. He killed several Germans and was wounded in the leg. Later he was bayoneted by a young German soldier whom he killed with a rock. He was captured in the Battle of the Bulge and survived a massacre of prisoners.

In later years, he refused to discuss the military service for which he was awarded the Silver Star and three Purple Hearts.

"Too many bad memories," he told an interviewer in 1997. "I don't want you to see me crying."

Tragedy also stalked other members of his family. Durning was 12 when his father died, and five of his sisters lost their lives to smallpox and scarlet fever.

A high school counselor told him he had no talent for art, languages or math and should learn office skills. But after seeing "King Kong" and some of James Cagney's films, Durning knew what he wanted to do.

Leaving home at 16, he worked in a munitions factory, on a slag heap and in a barbed-wire factory.

Durning and his first wife had three children before divorcing in 1972. In 1974, he married his high school sweetheart, Mary Ann Amelio.

He is survived by his children, Michele, Douglas and Jeannine. The family planned to have a private family service and burial at Arlington National Cemetery.

___

AP reporter Andrew Dalton contributed to this story.

http://www.rr.com/news/topic/article/rr/...ies_in_NYC
 
12-25-2012 03:44 PM
Find all posts by this user Quote this message in a reply
Advertisement


Coopdaddy67 Offline
Hall of Famer
*

Posts: 16,770
Joined: Nov 2005
Reputation: 85
I Root For: ice cream
Location:
Post: #2
RE: Durning, king of character actors, dies in NYC
He was terrific in anything he was in.
 
12-25-2012 05:12 PM
Find all posts by this user Quote this message in a reply
CliftonAve Online
Heisman
*

Posts: 21,880
Joined: May 2012
Reputation: 1171
I Root For: Jimmy Nippert
Location:
Post: #3
RE: Durning, king of character actors, dies in NYC
I always remember him as the mayor in Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. LOL!
 
12-25-2012 07:03 PM
Find all posts by this user Quote this message in a reply
ctipton Offline
Jersey Retired
Jersey Retired

Posts: 32,482
Joined: Mar 2004
Reputation: 140
I Root For: UC and the Reds
Location: Cincinnati West Side

DonatorsDonators
Post: #4
RE: Durning, king of character actors, dies in NYC
(12-25-2012 07:03 PM)CliftonAve Wrote:  I always remember him as the mayor in Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. LOL!

He was the governor.
 
12-25-2012 08:13 PM
Find all posts by this user Quote this message in a reply
Advertisement


BearChatter v2.0 Offline
Rounding Third and headed...
Jersey Retired

Posts: 8,548
Joined: Nov 2009
Reputation: 62
I Root For: Da Bearcats!
Location: Blue Ash
Post: #5
RE: Durning, king of character actors, dies in NYC
He was in Tootsie too. He played Jessica Lange's father who had the hots for the In Drag Dustin Hoffman character. Had some funny moments.
 
12-25-2012 10:09 PM
Find all posts by this user Quote this message in a reply
bcat80 Offline
1st String
*

Posts: 1,089
Joined: Jan 2006
Reputation: 12
I Root For: The Bearcats
Location: Chicago

Donators
Post: #6
RE: Durning, king of character actors, dies in NYC
I didn't know he died. My wife and I were just talking about him the other night about how well he played the parish priest in "Everybody Loves Raymond."
 
12-27-2012 12:11 PM
Find all posts by this user Quote this message in a reply
Billy_Bearcat Offline
Hall of Famer
*

Posts: 18,859
Joined: Mar 2004
Reputation: 401
I Root For: UC Bearcats
Location:

Donators
Post: #7
RE: Durning, king of character actors, dies in NYC
His Governor Pappy O'Daniel in O' Brother Where Art Thou was my favorite.
"Boy, we ain't one-at-a-timin' it here. We're MASS COMMUNICATIN!"
 
12-28-2012 12:06 AM
Find all posts by this user Quote this message in a reply
Post Reply 




User(s) browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)


Copyright © 2002-2024 Collegiate Sports Nation Bulletin Board System (CSNbbs), All Rights Reserved.
CSNbbs is an independent fan site and is in no way affiliated to the NCAA or any of the schools and conferences it represents.
This site monetizes links. FTC Disclosure.
We allow third-party companies to serve ads and/or collect certain anonymous information when you visit our web site. These companies may use non-personally identifiable information (e.g., click stream information, browser type, time and date, subject of advertisements clicked or scrolled over) during your visits to this and other Web sites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services likely to be of greater interest to you. These companies typically use a cookie or third party web beacon to collect this information. To learn more about this behavioral advertising practice or to opt-out of this type of advertising, you can visit http://www.networkadvertising.org.
Powered By MyBB, © 2002-2024 MyBB Group.