Ben Gazzara: Rest in Peace

Actor Ben Gazzara passed away on February 3, 2011, his attorney, Jay Julien confirmed to the press. The cause was of death was pancreatic cancer.

Born Biagio Anthony Gazzara in Manhattan on Aug. 28, 1930, he was the son of Italian immigrants and Italian was his first language. Gazzara became interested in acting while growing up and studied at the Dramatic Workshop in Midtown. In 1951, he auditioned for the Actors Studio and was accepted, kicking off a movie career that would endure for decades.

Ben Gazzara was married three times: to Louis Erickson from 1951 to 1957; to Janice Rule from 1961 to 1979 and to Elke Stuckmann Gazaard, whom he wed in 1982. His wife, Elke, survives him as well as two daughters, Elizabeth (from his marriage to Janice Rule) and Danja, his wife Elke’s daughter whom he adopted. He is also survived by a brother, Anthony.

Old-timers and serious film buffs will continue to remember Gazzara for his role as the defendant in the 1959 courtroom drama “Anatomy of a Murder. ” He played a military man who is on trial for killing his wife’s rapist. James Stewart played his attorney.  Gazzara said in 2009: “… I had a wonderful time. I got to work with my first movie star, James Stewart, a star that I grew up trying to imitate as a kid. And there I was acting with him in the same scene. I was so really overjoyed to be doing that, and proud. And then he liked me, which made me even prouder. He invited me to dinner, mano-a-mano, more than once, and I really appreciated that. He took an interest in me, and I watched him work. …”

Gazzara also originated the role of Brick on Broadway in  “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” and had his own TV series in the 60s called “Run for Your Life.” He played terminally ill attorney Paul Bryan who is told he only has a year or two to live. Gazzara called the series hard work: “that came at a period where things were very slow in the movie world for me. So I had to pay the rent, and the offer was good, but it was before the big, big money in television, 1965. And that was hard work, I gotta tell you. You know we made 30 one-hour shows a year? I was in every scene, morning, noon and night. It was really tiresome, I gotta tell you. Hard, hard. Ran for three years, and we made 80, 85 shows.”

In the 1970s, he collaborated with actor-turned-director, John Cassavetes in several films, most notably “The Killing of a Chinese Bookie” (1976), in which he played Cosmo Vitelli, a strip club owner in debt to the mob. Gazzara counted it among his three favorite film roles. The other two are: 1970’s “Husbands” (also directed by Cassavetes and co-starring him and Peter Falk); and 1979’s ‘Saint Jack” (directed by Peter Bogdanovich). Although he did do a fantasic job in the tough guy roles, he also played a saint in the 1988 Italian movie “Don Bosco,” the story of the 19th century Italian priest who worked in Turin and founded the Salesian order.