Posted on 07/16/2017 5:25:14 PM PDT by Borges
Martin Landau, the all-purpose actor who showcased his versatility as a master of disguise on the Mission: Impossible TV series and as a broken-down Bela Lugosi in his Oscar-winning performance in Ed Wood, has died. He was 89.
TMZ is reporting that Landau, who shot to fame by playing a homosexual henchman in Alfred Hitchcock’s 1959 classic North by Northwest, died Saturday of "unexpected complications" after a brief stay at UCLA Medical Center.
After he quit CBS’ Mission: Impossible after three seasons in 1969 because of a contract dispute, Landau’s career was on the rocks until he was picked by Francis Ford Coppola to play Abe Karatz, the business partner of visionary automaker Preston Tucker (Jeff Bridges), in Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988).
Landau received a best supporting actor nomination for that performance, then backed it up the following year with another nom for starring as Judah Rosenthal, an ophthalmologist who has his mistress (Angelica Huston) killed, in Woody Allen’s Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989).
Landau lost out on Oscar night to Kevin Kline and Denzel Washington, respectively, in those years but finally prevailed for his larger-than-life portrayal of horror-movie legend Lugosi in the biopic Ed Wood (1994), directed by Tim Burton.
Landau also starred as Commander John Koenig on the 1970s science-fiction series Space: 1999 opposite his Mission: Impossible co-star Barbara Bain, his wife from 1957 until their divorce in 1993.
A former newspaper cartoonist, Landau turned down the role of Mr. Spock in the NBC series Star Trek, which went to Leonard Nimoy (who later effectively replaced Landau on Mission: Impossible after Trek was canceled).
Landau also was an admired acting teacher who taught the craft to the likes of Jack Nicholson. And in the 1950s, he was best friends with James Dean and, for several months, the boyfriend of Marilyn Monroe. “She could be wonderful, but she was incredibly insecure, to the point she could drive you crazy,” he told The New York Times in 1988.
Landau was born in Brooklyn on June 20, 1928. At age 17, he landed a job as a cartoonist for the New York Daily News, but he turned down a promotion and quit five years later to pursue acting.
“It was an impulsive move on my part to do that,” Landau told The Jewish Journal in 2013. “To become an actor was a dream I must’ve had so deeply and so strongly because I left a lucrative, well-paying job that I could do well to become an unemployed actor. It’s crazy if you think about it. To this day, I can still hear my mother’s voice saying, ‘You did what?!’ ”
In 1955, he auditioned for Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio (choosing a scene from Clifford Odets’ Clash by Night against the advice of friends), and he and Steve McQueen were the only new students accepted that year out of the 2,000-plus aspirants who had applied.
With his dark hair and penetrating blue eyes, Landau found success on New York stages in Goat Song, Stalag 17 and First Love. Hitchcock caught his performance on opening night opposite Edward G. Robinson in a road production of Middle of the Night, the first Broadway play written by Paddy Chayefsky, and cast him as the killer Leonard in North by Northwest.
In Middle of the Night, “I played a very macho guy, 180 degrees from Leonard, who I chose to play as a homosexual — very subtly — because he wanted to get rid of Eva Marie Saint with such a vengeance,” he recalled in a 2012 interview.
As the ally of James Mason and nemesis of Saint and Cary Grant, Landau plummets to his death off Mount Rushmore in the movie’s climactic scene. With his slick, sinister gleam and calculating demeanor, he attracted the notice of producers and directors.
He went on to perform for such top directors as Joseph L. Mankiewicz in Cleopatra (1963) — though he said most of his best work on that film was sent to the cutting-room floor — George Stevens in The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965), John Sturges in The Hallelujah Trail (1965) and Henry Hathaway in Nevada Smith (1966).
Landau met Bruce Geller, the eventual creator of Mission: Impossible, when he invited the writer to an acting class. Bain was in the class as well, and Geller wrote for them the parts of spies Rollin Hand and Cinnamon Carter. Landau earned an Emmy nomination for each of his three seasons on the series.
He could have starred in another series.
“I turned down Star Trek. It would’ve been torturous,” he said during a 2011 edition of the PBS documentary series Pioneers of Television. “I would’ve probably died playing that role. I mean, even the thought of it now upsets me. It was the antithesis of why I became an actor. I mean, to play a character that Lenny (Nimoy) was better suited for, frankly, a guy who speaks in a monotone who never gets excited, never has any guilt, never has any fear or was affected on a visceral level. Who wants to do that?”
Landau found a kindred spirit in Burton, who also cast him in Sleepy Hollow (1999) and as the voice of a Vincent Price-like science teacher in the horror-movie homage, Frankenweenie (2012).
“Tim and I don’t finish a sentence,” Landau told the Los Angeles Times in 2012. “There’s something oddly kinesthetic about it. We kind of understand each other.”
Landau played puppet master Geppetto in a pair of Pinocchio films and appeared in such films as Pork Chop Hill (1959), City Hall (1996), The X-Files: Fight the Future (1998), Rounders (1998), Edtv (1999), The Majestic (2001), Lovely, Still (2008) and Mysteria (2011).
On television, he starred in the Twilight Zone episodes “Mr. Denton on Doomsday” and and “The Jeopardy Room,” played the title role in the 1999 Showtime telefilm Bonnano: A Godfather’s Story and could be found on The Untouchables, Bonanza, Gunsmoke, Maverick, Wanted: Dead or Alive, Wagon Train, I Spy and The Man From U.N.C.L.E.
More recently, Landau earned Emmy noms for playing the father of Anthony LaPaglia’s character on CBS’ Without a Trace and guest-starring as an out-of-touch movie producer on HBO’s Entourage. He portrayed billionaire J. Howard Marshall, the 90-year-old husband of Anna Nicole Smith, in a 2013 Lifetime biopic about the sex symbol, and starred for Atom Egoyan opposite Christopher Plummer in Remember (2015).
Landau worked as director, teacher and executive director at the Actors Studio West. He has been credited with helping to guide the talents of such actors as Nicholson, Huston, Warren Oates and Harry Dean Stanton.
Survivors include his daughters Susan (a casting director) and Juliet (an actress-dancer) from his marriage to Bain.
Ah, yes - Mission Ridiculous - remember it well.
It just so happens we’re watching an episode of Mission Impossible. He was one of my favorite actors.
Sad news, loved seeing him in every role he played. Mission Impossible was the greatest!
RIP Mr. Landau, and thanks.
Loved Landau in that role, and also Barbara Bain.
He had a little role in “Entourage” where Ari Gold meets him and asks him if he wants a ride in his BMW. “That Nazi sled??” he answers.
His loss.
I liked Space 1999, but to this day I bust a gut watching him in his role as the indian brave “walks stooped-over” in Tbe Hallelujiah Trail.
All the good ones are gone, now.
Bummer, good actor. I still have my Space 1999 lunchbox.
When I was a kid I though he had invented the vinyl roof.
I got to meet him at a DragonCon several years ago.
He also talked to a large packed room about Space:1999 and some things after that.
Martin struck me as a very personable and likeable guy.
One TV role I remember from reruns of The Untouchables had him as a villian being defended by an unscrupulous lawyer played by Jack Klugman.
RIP Mr.Landau.
Juliet famous for portray Drusilla on TV’s Buffy TVS & Angel
Loved Landau in that role, and also Barbara Bain.
They were also both in “Space 1999”, although even good actors could not save that silly show.
I had the large Eagle from Space:1999.
Maybe I had the lunchbox. I remember seeing it.
I still remember the ITC opening.
Both ‘Star Trek’ and ‘Mission Impossible’ were Desilu productions. Lucille Ball gave the go-ahead to make them. She had a good sense of what would last!
“The Man Who Was Never Born”; The Outer Limits (1963)
Great acting.
That makes 2. George Romero died today as well. Who’s next?
Dang — prayers for the family.
Damn, did I have a crush on “Cinnamon”! She was one sultry gal on Mission Impossible.
His portrayal of Lugosi was unbelievable, and heartbreaking. I’ll never forget it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.