Mitchell Ryan, the square-jawed actor who played a retired general for heroin smuggling in the first deadly gun movie, a former Dark Shadows prisoner and a disgusting father in Dharma & Greg, has died. He was 88 years old.
Ryan died Friday of congestive heart failure at his home in Los Angeles, his stepdaughter Denise Fried told The Hollywood Reporter.
Ryan was perhaps best as Curtie Austin, the owner of the ranch who mixes with the wrong crowd, in Lee Marvin-Jack Palance Western Monte Walsh (1970), directed by William Fracker from a novel by Jack Schaefer (Shane).
Ryan had a great year in 1973 when he appeared with Clint Eastwood in High Plains Drifter and Magnum Force – the latter as a burned-out motorcycle patrol – with Robert Mitchum in Peter Yates’ Friends of Eddie Coyle and as a hippie-hating detective with Robert Blake in Electra Glide in Blue.
Ryan also portrays the head of a sanatorium and leader of a druid cult on Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995), Hugh Hefner in Death of a Centerfold: The Dorothy Stratten Story (1981) and the father of Mini Driver in Grosse Pointe Blank (1997).
As General Peter McAllister, Ryan is trapped in an inverted car and rises in a fireball on Hollywood Boulevard in Richard Donner’s Deadly Weapon (1987) by detectives Martin Riggs (Mel Gibson) and Roger Murto (Danny Glover). their first film partnership.
Ryan later played him for laughter in about 120 episodes of the 1997-2002 ABC Dharma & Greg sitcom as Edward Montgomery, Greg’s wealthy, drunken father (Thomas Gibson) and a proud Notre Dame graduate who often quarrels with Dharma (hippie father Rachins).
For three years, Ryan appeared as a former Burke Devlin prisoner in Dark Shadows before being fired in 1966. “I was so drunk this year that I can barely remember what it was about,” he told TV Guide in 1976. (He said I eventually gave up alcohol.)
On Facebook, his Dark Shadows colleague Catherine Lee Scott wrote that Ryan “was a great gift in my life.” I cherish my warm memories of his beautiful soul. I have a broken heart. ” He played Burke Devlin in the soap, and she was Maggie Evans.
He later appeared in other daily series, including All My Children, Santa Barbara and General Hospital.
In a 2018 interview, Ryan said he almost got the role of Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation.
“I was pretty well thought out until they came across that amazing British actor Patrick Stewart,” he said. “I do not know how close I was, but they told me [at the time] I was really thoughtful and it looked good. “
He appeared in the series in 1989 as the estranged father of Cmdr. William Riker (Jonathan Fracks).
Ryan was born in Cincinnati on January 11, 1934 and grew up in Louisville, Kentucky. His father was a news salesman and his mother a writer.
After a time in the U.S. Navy, where he served in the entertainment department of special services during the Korean War, Ryan became convinced that acting was for him after seeing Warren Oates participate in a 1953 production of Dark of the Moon in Louisville.
“If you are [young] and you don’t have your own feelings, theater has a fatal attraction, “he told TV Guide. “I was fully engaged, working for nothing, 20 hours a day. The game of being someone else took me away and gave me the illusion of meaning and value. ”
He moved to New York and worked on stage and television, then made his film debut on Thunder Road (1958), starring Mitchum.
“I had a little scene with Mitchum who just wasn’t a god and was at the peak of his popularity,” Ryan recalls. “He was standing next to the camera, joking with the team. I finally heard my scene being shouted, at which point Mitchum came up to me, paused for a second, then said, “Remember, I’m the Big Mitch, and you’re the Little Mitch.” He looked grim, then burst out laughing and he said, “Let’s do this fucking thing.” “
Ryan appeared on television shows such as The Naked City and Defenders and joined Joseph Pap’s Shakespeare Festival in New York, then reached Broadway in 1966 as one of the bad guys who terrorized a blind woman (Lee Remick) in the thriller Wait Until Dark, directed by Arthur Penn.
He noted that in Monte Walsh, his hero was named “the second best armor rider in the West.” However, Ryan had never ridden a horse before, earning him the nickname “The Lincoln Center Kid” on set.
In the 1970s, Ryan starred in three short television series: Chase, a cops show co-created by Stephen J. Channel; Executive Suite, based on William Holden’s 1954 film; and Having Babies, Hospital Drama.
His film credits include Two Minute Warning (1976), Midway (1976), Hot Shots! Part Deux (1993), Speechless (1994), Judge Dredd (1995), Liar Liar (1997) and The Devil’s Own (1997).
In addition to his stepdaughter, the survivors include his wife Barbara and grandchildren Ashley, Jacqueline, Olivia, Kayla and Noah.
He published memoirs, The Fall of a Sparrow, in 2021.