Ward, identified for his work in “The Proper Stuff,” “Brief Cuts,” and quite a few different movies, died on Could 8 at age 79.
No reason for loss of life was given.
Ward began appearing within the early Seventies, following three years of service within the U.S. Air Pressure. A renaissance man, Ward additionally did stints as a short-order prepare dinner, a boxer, and labored as a lumberjack in Alaska. His first main function got here within the Clint Eastwood movie “Escape from Alcatraz” in 1979.
In “The Proper Stuff,” Ward portrayed real-life Mercury 7 astronaut Virgil “Gus” Grissom. He switched gears in “Henry & June,” enjoying chain-smoking, hard-drinking writer Henry Miller, who travels to Paris in 1931 to complete his guide “Tropic of Most cancers.”
In 1988, Ward purchased the movie rights to “Miami Blues,” which showcased Ward as Hoke Mosely, a veteran Miami detective attempting to corral a slick ex-con.
Ward later joined forces with Robert Altman in “The Participant,” performed a gangster in Alan Rudolph’s “Equinox,” and was a TV information anchor in Tim Robbins’ “Bob Roberts.” In 1993, he performed certainly one of three associates who discover a corpse whereas fishing in “Brief Cuts.”
“The distinctive factor about Fred Ward is that you simply by no means knew the place he was going to pop up, so unpredictable have been his profession decisions,” Hofmann mentioned in an emailed assertion.
A few of Ward’s different movie credit embrace “Summer time Catch,” “Candy Residence Alabama” and “Abandon.” In tv, Ward appeared in “The USA of Tara,” “Gray’s Anatomy,” “Leverage,” “True Detective” and amongst different collection.
Additionally an artist, in recent times Ward directed a few of his artistic expertise to portray.
He’s survived by his spouse of 27 years, Marie-France Ward and his son Django Ward.
