2021: In Memoriam

Within the last month, we have bid farewell to four legendary actors. Each were unbelievably talented and they performed in nearly every medium of entertainment, from movies and television to live theatre and radio. Among this quartet, there is a total of Two Oscars, Two Golden Globes, 18 Emmy Awards, and Four Tony Awards. Three out of the four of them also appeared in Disney movies. In today’s blog, I thought we could explore the legacies of these fine actors.

Hal Holbrook passed away on January 23rd, 2021 at 95. Holbrook was primarily known for acting in historical dramas throughout most of his career. In 1966, he received a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his performance as Mark Twain in Mark Twain Tonight!, a one-man play that he also wrote and played numerous times throughout his career. In 1974, Holbrook received an Emmy Award for his performance as Abraham Lincoln in the mini-series Lincoln (1974-1976), and ironically he later appeared in the role of Francis Preston Blair in Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln (2012), which starred Daniel Day-Lewis as Lincoln. In addition, Holbrook can be recognized for his roles in the “Dirty Harry” film Magnum Force (1973), Fletch Lives (1989) and for his Oscar-nominated performance as Ron Franz in Into the Wild (2007). Fans of Disney Animation will also remember Holbrook as the voice of Amphitryon, Hercules’s adoptive father in Hercules (1997) and Mayday the Firetruck in Planes: Fire and Rescue (2013).

Cloris Leachman died on January 27th, 2021 due to natural causes at the age of 94. Leachman is best-known for her portrayal of quirky characters, including Phyllis Lindstrom on The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970-1977), a role for which she won two Emmys. She later won a Golden Globe for recreating the character of Phyllis Lindstrom in a spin-off series Phyllis (1975-1977), which lasted two seasons. Around the time that she played Phyllis Lindstrom, she also became a member of Mel Brooks’s ensemble cast, appearing in three of Brooks’s movies: Young Frankenstein (1974), High Anxiety (1977) and History of the World: Part I (1981). Leachman won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her performance in The Last Picture Show (1971) and for Disney, she acted in the live-action films The North Avenue Irregulars (1979), Herbie Goes Bananas (1980), and Sky High (2005). She also lent her voice to episodes of Phineas and Ferb (2007-2015) and Elena of Avalor (2016-2020), as well as the English-dub version of the Disney/Studio Ghibli film Castle in the Sky (1998). 

Cicely Tyson passed on the very next day, January 28th, 2021, at 96 years of age. One of the trademarks of her career was portraying strong-willed women. She received a Best Actress Oscar Nomination for her performance as Rebecca, the mother in Sounder (1972), and throughout the later years of her career she played women who remained strong despite receiving a great deal of unfortunate discrimination as well as abuse: the title role in the TV movie The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (1974), Sipsey in Fried Green Tomatoes (1991), and Constantine Jefferson in The Help (2013). She collaborated with Tyler Perry twice, playing the role of Aunt Myrtle in Diary of a Mad Black Woman in 2005 and again in Madea’s Family Reunion in 2006. In 2013, Tyson received a Tony Award for portraying the role of Mrs. Carrie Watts in the revival of the play The Trip to Bountiful which featured an all African-American cast. (The role of Carrie Watts previously won Geraldine Page an Oscar for portraying it in the 1985 movie version.) For Disney, Tyson lent her voice to an episode of the Disney Channel Original Animated Series The Proud Family (2001-2005).

Most recently, Christopher Plummer passed on February 5th, 2021 due to complications from a fall, at age 91. Plummer will forever be remembered for his performance as Captain Georg von Trapp in The Sound of Music (1965), though his career was much more versatile than that, playing princes, kings, aristocrats and other famous people. He won two Tony Awards: Best Actor in a Musical in 1974 for Cyrano in which he portrayed Cyrano de Bergerac and Best Actor in a Play in 1997 for Barrymore in which he impersonated John Barrymore. In 2012, he won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his performance in Beginners (2011), becoming the oldest actor to win an Oscar at 82 years of age, surpassing Jessica Tandy who had previously held the record when she won Best Actress at age 76 for Driving Miss Daisy (1989). He received another Best Supporting Actor Oscar Nomination for his performance as J. Paul Getty in All The Money in The World (2017) and that same year he also portrayed Ebeneezer Scrooge in The Man Who Invented Christmas (2017). He also received acclaim for playing journalist Mike Wallace in the 1999 film The Insider. His Disney roles include playing John Adams Gates, grandfather of Benjamin Franklin “Ben” Gates in National Treasure (2004) and voicing the greedy Charles Muntz in Disney/Pixar’s Up (2009).

These four actors all had incredible careers and they were all fortunate enough to live into their 90s. While it is sad that each of their deaths occurred within a few weeks of each other, there is no doubt that fans will continue to enjoy their talents for a long time. Hats of to them all!