Vale: Louis Gossett Jr.

Veteran actor Louis Gossett Jr., best known for An Officer and a Gentleman, Iron Eagle, and Roots has died, aged 87.

He died on Thursday night in Santa Monica, California. No cause of death was revealed.

Gossett Jr became the first Black man to win a supporting actor Oscar for An Officer and a Gentleman opposite Richard Gerein 1983. He also won a Golden Globe for the same role.

His role as Fiddler in the groundbreaking 1977 miniseries, Roots, also saw him become the first Black man to win a supporting actor Emmy.

Gossett went to Hollywood for the first time in 1961 to make the film version of A Raisin in the Sun, staying in a cockroach-infested motel that was one of the few places to allow Black people.

In 1968, he returned to Hollywood for a major role in Companions in Nightmare for NBC.

Universal Studios had rented him a convertible but he was stopped by a Los Angeles County sheriff’s officer who ordered him to turn down the radio and put up the car’s roof before letting him go.

Within minutes, he was stopped by eight sheriff’s officers, who had him lean against the car and made him open the trunk while they called the car rental agency before letting him go.

“More than anything, it was a huge affirmation of my position as a Black actor,” he wrote in his memoir.”

His other credits included Enemy Mine, Sadat and Iron Eagle. TV movies included The Story of Satchel Paige, Backstairs at the White House, The Josephine Baker Story, for which he won another Golden Globe, and Roots Revisited. Series included The Watchmen, Hap & Leonard, Hawaii Five-0, The Good Fight, Madam Secretary, Boarwalk Empire, ER, Ellen, Touched by an Angel and more.

He played an obstinate patriarch in the 2023 remake of The Color Purple.

He also founded the Eracism Foundation to help create a world where racism doesn’t exist.

Source: ABC