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Louis Gossett Jr., ‘An Officer and a Gentleman’ Oscar Winner, Dies at 87
Louis Gossett Jr., the Oscar and Emmy winning actor of 'An Officer and a Gentleman' and 'Roots' has died. He was 87.
Louis Gossett Jr., who won a supporting actor Oscar for playing the hard-as-nails drill instructor in 1982’s “An Officer and a Gentleman” a few years after winning an Emmy for his role as the cunning Fiddler in “Roots,” has died, the AP reports. He drew a nomination for portraying the Egyptian president who made peace with Israel in the 1983 TV movie “Sadat.” He was also nominated for his performance on the 1978 variety special “The Sentry Collection Presents Ben Vereen: His Roots”; for playing Levi Mercer in the 1979 NBC miniseries “Backstairs at the White House”; for lead actor in a drama series for “Palmerstown, U.S.A.” in 1981; for lead actor in a miniseries or special for the Volker Schlondorff-directed “A Gathering of Old Men” (1987), in which he starred with Richard Widmark and Holly Hunter; and for multiple appearances as Anderson Walker on CBS’ “Touched by an Angel” in 1997. In 1963 he appeared on the Rialto in the Langston Hughes adaptation “Tambourines to Glory,” and he was a replacement in the controversial hit musical “Golden Boy” starring Sammy Davis Jr. in which Gossett played the Mephistophlean boxing promoter Eddie Satin.
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