When an actor dies during filming, the project will forever serve as a memorial to the performer.
Whether these fallen stars were at the height of their fame or had yet to become screen
legends, here's a look at the tragic loss of actors who passed away during production.
Beloved television and film actor John Ritter died of an aortic dissection at a Burbank,
California hospital in 2003 after falling ill on the set of ABC's 8 Simple Rules for
Dating My Teenage Daughter. He was 54.
The son of film star and country musician Tex Ritter, John Ritter effortlessly shifted
throughout his career between comedies like Bad Santa and independent dramas like Sling
Blade. However, John Ritter first became a household name in the late '70s playing Jack
Tripper, a working-class straight man pretending to be gay in order to share an apartment with
two women, in the iconic sitcom Three's Company. In 1984, the performance earned Ritter an
Emmy for outstanding lead actor in a comedy series, as well as a Golden Globe.
Ritter's Three's Company co-star, Joyce DeWitt, told People magazine in 2002,
"John's all about not taking life too seriously. There were days we went home from rehearsal
with our cheeks sore from laughing."
Legendary comedian Redd Foxx rose to international fame as the outspoken junk dealer Fred Sanford
in the groundbreaking '70s sitcom, Sanford and Son, where he was famous for faking massive
heart attacks to get out of sticky situations.
"You hear that Elizabeth? I'm coming to join you, honey!"
In 1991, he made a triumphant return to television in the CBS sitcom The Royal Family. But during
filming, Foxx tragically suffered an actual heart attack. A network representative told
The Los Angeles Times,
"They were rehearsing on the set and clowning around, and Redd was sort of breaking people
up when he collapsed. They all thought he was joking around at first, and then they
called the paramedics."
Sadly, the heart attack proved fatal, and the series was cancelled. Foxx was 68.
Brandon Lee, son of martial artist and cultural icon Bruce Lee, was just launching his own
movie career when he landed the leading role in The Crow. The superhero film was a hit
at the box office and made him an international star, but Lee, whose own father famously died
of a cerebral edema at age 32, tragically didn't live to see that happen. While filming
a scene at approximately 12:30 a.m on March 31, 1993, Lee was accidentally shot in the
abdomen with an improperly loaded prop gun by his co-star.
Lee was rushed to the New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington, N.C., but died
of an unstoppable internal hemorrhaging following six hours of surgery. He was 28. Lee's untimely
death, which occurred less than three weeks before he was set to marry his fiancee, was
eventually ruled an accident due to negligence. District Attorney Jerry Spivey said,
"There's no indication that I see at all from the investigative report that anyone intentionally
hurt Brandon."
Despite boasting an acting career that spanned almost 30 years, sadly Vic Morrow is probably
best known for the role that resulted in his tragic death. While filming Twilight Zone:
The Movie on the morning of July 23, 1982, Morrow and two children were killed on set
during a helicopter stunt gone wrong when the pilot was temporarily blinded by an explosive
charge.
After a nine-month trial that ended in 1987, the film's director, John Landis, and five
other men were acquitted of involuntary manslaughter. However, the pilot of the helicopter, Dorcey
Wingo, bashed Landis for illegally hiring children, telling the Los Angeles Times,
"Why didn't [Landis and the others] just come out and tell me that? Why did they keep it
from me? Those children shouldn't have been there in the first place."
Jon-Erik Hexum's death will go down as one of the most unnecessary in Hollywood history.
On October 12, 1984, during a filming delay on the set of his CBS action series Cover
Up, Hexum tried to lighten the mood by playing around with a .44 Magnum pistol loaded with
blanks. According to reports, he put the gun to his head and said, quote, "Can you believe
this crap?"
Then he pulled the trigger. Neurosurgeon Dr. David Ditsworth told People that the force
of the blast,
"...caused massive hemorrhaging on the right side, and the blast effect caused disruption
of the remainder of the brain. An injury of this magnitude is virtually always fatal."
After Hexum succumbed to his injuries, his death was ruled accidental. However, his mother
received an undisclosed settlement from Twentieth Century Fox Television. Jon-Erik Hexum was
just 27.
While filming scenes for The Return of the Musketeers in Spain in 1988, comedic actor
Roy Kinnear, who is best known for his role in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,
fell off his horse and fractured his pelvis. The British performer was taken to a nearby
hospital in Madrid, where he suffered a heart attack brought on by his internal injuries
and died the following day. He was 54.
According to the Independent, Kinnear's widow, Carmel Cryan, sued the production for damages
and was later awarded 650,000 pounds in addition to their legal costs. She said,
"I feel justice has been done. Somebody can't just die and we all forget about it. Nothing
will ever make up for the last six years of hell or the rest of our lives without him."
Kinnear's son Rory Kinnear became an actor himself, starring in such hits as Skyfall,
Black Mirror, and Penny Dreadful. In 2017, he told The Guardian,
"I feel like we all become our parents in some ways, whether or not they are still alive.
I have plenty of memories of my father and I was able to, in some ways, continue my relationship
with him by watching the stuff he made."
Rawhide star Eric Fleming became so synonymous with his character Gil Favor that when he
left the series in 1965, a network executive reportedly ordered the show's cancellation
after seeing just one episode without him.
A year later, though, tragedy struck as Fleming attempted to move onto the next phase of his
career. While filming a two-part episode in Peru for ABC's anthology series Off to See
the Wizard, Fleming and co-star Nico Minardos fell into a raging river when their canoe
overturned. Minardos managed to swim to safety, but Fleming tragically drowned. He was only
41.
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