Kiefer Sutherland, the actor’s son, announced his death in a message on social media. He thrived on horror, comedies, action, existential dramas and science fiction.
Donald Sutherlanda Canadian actor whose career spanned more than six decades, died on Thursday, June 20, 2024.
The news was announced on social media by his son, Kiefer Sutherland, who is also a well-known actor.
“It is with a heavy heart that I inform you that my father, Donald Sutherland, has passed away. I personally think he was one of the most important actors in the history of cinema. He was never let down by a role, good, bad or ugly. He loved what he did and he did what he loved and no one can ask for more than that.”he said in his message.
With a heavy heart, I tell you that my father, Donald Sutherland, has passed away. I personally think one of the most important actors in the history of film. Never daunted by a role, good, bad or ugly. He loved what he did and did what he loved, and one can never ask for more… pic.twitter.com/3EdJB03KKT
— Kiefer Sutherland (@RealKiefer) June 20, 2024
The actor – who is known for his roles in ‘The Dirty Dozen’, ‘Klute’, ‘Casanova’, ‘JFK’ and, most recently, the epic ‘The Hunger Games’ – received several awards during the his lifetime, including an honorary Oscar in 2018 for his lifetime achievement (though he was never nominated for Best Actor).
He won the Golden Globe twice, out of the nine he was nominated for: in 1996, thanks to his role in the miniseries “Citizen X”, for which he also won an Emmy Award, and in 2003, for the series “Road to War”. He was nominated for a BAFTA and a Razzie for the film ‘Lock Up’ in 1990. Since 2011 he has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Early in his career, as a teenager, Sutherland worked for a local radio station in his native Canada, and after his studies he began his artistic career, which led him to the prestigious London School of Music and Dramatic Art.
Beginning with small roles in British TV series in the 60s, the actor became an increasingly well-known figure in the UK. During this time, Sutherland appeared in classic plays brought to the small screen, an episode of ‘The Avengers’ and some episodes of the popular series ‘The Saint’.
These roles served as a springboard for bigger roles and turned him into the iconic face of Vernon Pinkley in The Dirty Dozen, the 1967 war film directed by Robert Aldrich, where he co-starred with big names of the time such as John Cassavetes, Charles Bronson and Lee Marvin.
Throughout his career, the actor played leading and supporting roles, in film and television, but also in the theater, where he took his first steps in college (playing, among other things, in Shakespeare’s “The Tempest”). He was always very attracted to the stage. “It is a place with hands that hug you, comfort you, push you, applaud you. It gives birth to people who make theater. It feeds them. He guides them. It frees them and they wear the mantle of this theater for the rest of their lives,” he said of theater at the University of Toronto’s HartHouse Theater, where he began his career. HartHouse decided to create an award in his honor to pay tribute to the best performers.
The actor never thought about retirement. In fact, his most recent role as the rogue President Snow in The Hunger Games – starring Jennifer Lawrence – had made him a star with a very different audience.
From the start of his career, Sutherland was also a staunch activist – so much so that he was being watched by US intelligence in the early 1970s – as revealed in 2017 thanks to declassified documents.
His private life was complicated. His first wife was Lois May Hardwick. The two met when they were students and married in 1959. They remained together until 1966, when Sutherland remarried Shirley Douglas, the daughter of a famous Canadian politician. The marriage lasted only four years, but the couple had two children, twins Rachel and the well-known Kiefer (Kiefer), who from a young age followed in his father’s footsteps while trying to carve out his own path.
The two divorced when Kiefer was five and the twins stayed with their mother in Toronto, while Donald, after a two-year relationship with Jane Fonda, remarried. Father and son starred in the same film. The youngster made his debut in 1983’s Max Dugan Returns, which also starred his father, and they reunited in 1996’s A Time to Kill. But only in the 2015 western Forsaken. , they shared more scenes together, eventually playing father and son.
Sutherland found stability with his third wife, French-Canadian actress Francine Racette, whom he met while filming “Alien Thunder.” The two married in 1972 and had three sons: All named after directors Nicolas Roeg (“Don’t Look Now”) and Frederick Rossif and actor Robert Redford. In an interview with The Guardian newspaper in 2005, Sutherland acknowledged that he had made some mistakes in his life, both personally and professionally. “It was all my fault. I was so dumb. But if I hadn’t made the mistakes I did, I wouldn’t have met the wonderful woman I’ve been married to for over 30 years.”
Source :Skai
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