Glenn Ford, 1916 - 2006.

Glenn Ford, a laconic, soft-spoken actor with an easy smile who played leading roles in many westerns, melodramas and romantic films from the early 1940s through the 60s, died yesterday at his Beverly Hills home. He was 90.

Richard Severo in the New York Times.

Another screen legend has passed away before the Academy ever got around to lauding him with an honorary Oscar.

Edward Copeland.

Updated through 9/1.

He was a journeyman actor of the finest kind, working in an impressive array of genres: Everything from gritty Westerns (Budd Boetticher's The Man from the Alamo, Delmer Daves's 3:10 to Yuma) to hardboiled film noir (Charles Vidor's Gilda, Fritz Lang's The Big Heat), from family-friendly comedies (Frank Capra's Pocketful of Miracles, Vincente Minnelli's The Courtship of Eddie's Father) to edge-of-your-seat thrillers... My favorite of his many first-rate performances: His chronically boozy, increasingly desperate small-town doctor who fears he has contracted rabies in a remote desert community, and who's repeatedly detoured by distractions (like the va-va-voom Stella Stevens) while on the road to seeking aid, in Gilberto Gazcon's Rage (1966).

Joe Leydon.

His son, Peter Ford, is writing a biography.

Update: Online listening tip. Clips from NPR.

Update, 9/1: Ronald Bergan in the Guardian: "The hairstyles signposted Glenn Ford's long and active career; from the full and wavy to the sleek, dark gigolo look, to the short back and sides, to a severe crewcut that gradually shrivelled like dry grass on the prairie. His face, that began boyish in prewar B films, hovered somewhere between the rugged handsomeness of William Holden and Tom Ewell's Thurberesque one, allowing him to be extremely dour in films noirs or to display the righteous nobility of a lone western hero, while also being able to play perplexed characters in comedies."

Posted by dwhudson at August 31, 2006 12:38 AM