Twice Academy Award nominated actor and star of Steven Spielberg’s Jaws, Roy Scheider, died yesterday after a long battle with the incurable disease Myeloma. He was 75.
Roy Scheider was a highly respected by fellow actors, critics, and by myself. Being only 21 I wasn’t able to follow his career, I never saw him go from a nobody to a star like I did with Heath Ledger. To me and too many others Roy Schieder was and always will be Chief Martin Brody. However that isn’t to say his role in Jaws was his only achievement, far from it. Scheider first received critical acclaim with his role as Detective Buddy Rosso in the five time Academy Award winning film The French Connection, in which he was nominated for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. Over the 70s Scheider continued to star in commercial and critical hits like Jaws, Marathon Man, and Sorcerer. Until he was once again received an Academy Award nomination, this time for his leading role in musical All That Jazz. In the 90s Roy was the star of SeaQuest DSV which despite its large fan base (which included me) only lasted three seasons. In 2004 he was the only good thing about the scenes involving Frank Castle’s family in the comic book based action flick, The Punisher. Roy’s last two films, Dark Honeymoon and Iron Cross will be released this year.
The death of Roy Scheider has not only been a shock to me but also thought provoking. It has made me realise that due to the nature of their work many actors who have been immortalized in film, actors that I have always seen as no older than my own father, are in actual fact in their 70s. This means that over the next decade we could potentially loose many great cinematic stars and like Roy they will most likely be big shocks.
Rest in Peace, Roy Richard Scheider.
The seismically turbulent development path of Duke Nukem Forever had another slight trip today.
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