Oscar-winning actor William Hurt, star of Kiss of the Spider Woman and Body Heat, has died at the age of 71.
Deadline reported on the announcement of Hurt’s son Will: “It is with great sadness that the Hurt family mourns the passing of William Hurt, beloved father and Oscar-winning actor, on March 13, 2022, a week before his 72nd birthday. He died peacefully, among his family, a natural death.” Variety reported that a family friend confirmed the news.
Hurt won a Best Actor Oscar in 1986 for Kiss of the Spider Woman, in which he played a gay man who shares a cell with a political prisoner in Brazil. He received additional Oscar nominations for Best Actor for Children of a Lesser God and Broadcast News and Best Supporting Actor for A History of Violence.
Born in 1950, Hurt studied theology at university but turned to acting and entered the Juilliard School in 1972. After a series of stage roles, he landed his first major film role in Ken Russell’s horror television film Altered States. sensational at that time erotic thriller Body Heat, in which he starred with Kathleen Turner. The fame of Body Heat made him a name, and Hurt became a major star in the 1980s. He played a prominent role in the ensemble comedy-drama The Big Chill and the spy thriller Gorky Park, and then landed a role in the film Kiss of the Spider Woman directed by Hector Babenko.
Hurt achieved sensational success with his role as a transvestite cellmate of the revolutionary leftist Raul Giulia, winning Best Actor at Cannes as well as Best Actor at the Oscars. The following year, he played a teacher in Children of a Lesser God alongside Marley Matlin (later his co-star), who went on to become the first deaf Oscar winner. In 1988, he was nominated for an Oscar three times in a row for his role as a television reporter on Broadcast News.
In the 1990s, successful roles seemed elusive; mostly arthouse-leaning, it was in Wim Wenders’ mammoth, among others, but disappointed Until the End of the World, Chantal Ackerman’s Couch in New York, and Carl Franklin’s One Truth. In 2005, he had an unexpected success playing the atypical role of crime boss Richie Cusack in David Cronenberg’s A History of Violence, which earned him another Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Three years later, he may have made an even more unexpected appearance in the Marvel Cinematic Universe playing General Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross, a role he would reprise in Captain America: Civil War, Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame, and “Black Widow”.
In 2009, Matlin published a memoir describing the physical and emotional abuse at the hands of Hurt during their relationship. Hurt later said: “I apologized and I apologize for the pain I caused.”
Hurt was married twice: to Mary Beth Hurt from 1971 to 1982 and to Heidi Henderson from 1989 to 1992. He also had high-profile relationships with Matlyn, Sandra Jennings and Sandrine Bonner.