Charles Durning, ‘king of character actors,’ dies at 89

Charles 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 at his home in New York City. He was 89.Durning’s longtime agent and friend Judith Moss told The Associated Press that he died Monday 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 realisingDurning had been a dance instructor early in his career. Indeed, he had met his first wife, Carol, when both worked at a dance studio.Durningbegun 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.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.”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.

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Charles Durning, ‘king of character actors,’ dies at 89