Oscar winner, ‘Sound of Music’ star Christopher Plummer dies at 91

Christopher Plummer, the dashing award-winning actor who performed Captain von Trapp within the movie “The Sound of Music” and at 82 turned the oldest Academy Award appearing winner in historical past, has died. He was 91.
Plummer died Friday morning at his residence in Connecticut together with his spouse, Elaine Taylor, by his facet, mentioned Lou Pitt, his longtime good friend and supervisor
Over greater than 50 years within the trade, Plummer loved various roles starting from the movie “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,” to the voice of the villain in 2009’s “Up” and as a canny lawyer in Broadway’s “Inherit the Wind.”
But it was reverse Julie Andrews as von Trapp that made him a star. He performed an Austrian captain who should flee the nation together with his folk-singing household to flee service within the Nazi navy, a task he lamented was “humorless and one-dimensional.” Plummer spent the remainder of his life referring to the movie as “The Sound of Mucus” or “S&M.”
FILE – Christopher Plummer attends the premiere for “Knives Out” on day three of the Toronto International Film Festival on Sept. 7, 2019, in Toronto. (AP)
“We tried so hard to put humor into it,” he advised The Associated Press in 2007. “It was almost impossible. It was just agony to try to make that guy not a cardboard figure.”
The function catapulted Plummer to stardom, however he by no means took to main males components, regardless of his silver hair, beauty and ever-so-slight English accent. He most well-liked character components, contemplating them extra meaty.
Plummer had a outstanding movie renaissance late in life, which started together with his acclaimed efficiency as Mike Wallace in Michael Mann’s 1999 movie “The Insider,” continued in movies equivalent to 2001’s “A Beautiful Mind” and 2009’s “The Last Station,” by which he performed a deteriorating Tolstoy and was nominated for an Oscar.
In 2012, Plummer received a supporting actor Oscar for his function in “Beginners” as Hal Fields, a museum director who turns into overtly homosexual after his spouse of 44 years dies. His loving, ultimate relationship turns into an inspiration for his son, who struggles together with his father’s loss of life and learn how to discover intimacy in a brand new relationship.
“Too many people in the world are unhappy with their lot. And then they retire and they become vegetables. I think retirement in any profession is death, so I’m determined to keep crackin’,” he advised AP in 2011.

Plummer in 2017 changed Kevin Spacey as J. Paul Getty in “All the Money in the World” simply six weeks earlier than the movie was set to hit theaters. That selection that was formally validated in the very best manner for the movie — a supporting Oscar nomination for Plummer, his third. In 2019, he starred within the TV suspense drama collection “Departure.”
There had been fallow durations in his profession — a “Pink Panther” film right here, a “Dracula 2000″ there and even a “Star Trek” — as a Klingon, no much less. But Plummer had different causes than the scripts in thoughts.
“For a long time, I accepted parts that took me to attractive places in the world. Rather than shooting in the Bronx, I would rather go to the south of France, crazed creature than I am,” he advised AP in 2007. “And so I sacrificed a lot of my career for nicer hotels and more attractive beaches.”
The Canadian-born actor carried out many of the main Shakespeare roles, together with Hamlet, Cyrano, Iago, Othello, Prospero, Henry V and a staggering “King Lear” at Lincoln Center in 2004. He was frequent star on the Stratford Shakespeare Festival in Canada.
“I’ve become simpler and simpler with playing Shakespeare,” he mentioned in 2007. “I’m not as extravagant as I used to be. I don’t listen to my voice so much anymore. All the pitfalls of playing the classics — you can fall in love with yourself.”
He received two Tony Awards. The first was in 1974 for finest actor in a musical for enjoying the title function in “Cyrano” and his second in 1997 for his portrayal of John Barrymore in “Barrymore.” He additionally received two Emmys.
Plummer was born Arthur Christopher Orme Plummer in Toronto. His maternal great-grandfather was former Canadian Prime Minister Sir John Abbott. His mother and father divorced shortly after his delivery and he was raised by his mom and aunts.