He was the kind of actor who could chill a room with a single look, then burst into easy laughter the moment the director called cut. On screen, he became Hollywood’s poet of violence, turning every drawled threat, every slow, deliberate movement into something mythic. Off screen, he was the dad who answered late‑night calls, the brother who showed up unannounced with bad jokes and takeout, the restless craftsman still chasing stranger, smaller stories when others would have coasted on legend.
His heart gave out in the most ordinary way, a mundane ending for a man who always seemed indestructible. That contrast makes his legacy cut deeper: a gallery of brutal men with breakable souls, and a real life threaded with quiet kindness. The roles will keep playing in darkened rooms for decades, each frame holding the ghost of that dangerous smile—and the softer man it never fully revealed.
