A legendary sax player, an iconic sitcom grandfather,
and the old neighbor from a holiday movie classic are just a few of the stars who
had memorable turns in Martin Scorsese films but have sadly since passed away.
Martin Scorsese's first film, Who's That Knocking At My Door, began as a 1965 student project with
Harvey Keitel called Bring on the Dancing Girls. A subplot involving a young woman with whom Keitel's
character becomes involved was added in 1967. Actress and dancer Zina Bethune played Keitel's
love interest, whose complicated past proves too difficult for his Catholic-influenced upbringing.
Bethune began performing at an early age, despite suffering from scoliosis,
a condition that causes curvature of the spine. She danced with the New York City
Ballet when she was a teenager and began acting on Broadway and TV in the late 1950s,
including series regular work on the daytime soap The Nurses.
After Who's That Knocking At My Door, Bethune returned to TV and later formed her own
nonprofit dance company called Theater Bethune, which enrolled children with
disabilities in dance-related projects. Five days before her 67th birthday on February 12,
2012, she was driving in Los Angeles and exited her car to assist an injured animal
by the side of the road. She was struck by oncoming traffic and died at the age of 66.
After legendary producer Roger Corman saw Who's That Knocking On My Door,
he hired Scorcese to direct what would become 1972's Boxcar Bertha, a Depression Era-drama
about a Southern girl turned bank and train robber. Corman also connected Scorsese with
David Carradine to star as "Big" Bill Shelley, a union organizer who joins Bertha on her crime
spree. Carradine would later reunite with Scorsese for a cameo in Mean Streets, where
his unnamed character is shot in the back by a man played by Carradine's real-life brother, Robert.
Carradine appeared in various movies and TV shows before achieving widespread fame
on the 70s action series Kung Fu. The actor's eccentric personality, countercultural leanings,
and run-ins with the law took him out of the mainstream and into low-budget features like
Death Race 2000 and Q – The Winged Serpent. He enjoyed a brief career revival as the
titular evil final boss in both volumes of Kill Bill, which came out in 2003 and 2004. In 2009,
Carradine was found dead from asphyxiation in a hotel room in Thailand; he was 72.
In a pivotal scene in Scorsese's 1976 feature Taxi Driver, Robert De Niro's Travis Bickle
confesses to a veteran cabbie named Wizard that he has an urge to do something drastic. Wizard,
played by Peter Boyle, listens to the younger man and attempts to pass
along some advice about separating one's work life from personal time.
"Don't worry so much!"
But as viewers soon discover, those worries quickly turn Travis from a recluse into a violent,
dangerous individual with delusions of heroism. As for Peter Boyle, he was a popular character
actor and occasional leading man in the 70s, in the likes of such films as 1970's Joe. He
also memorably showed off his comedy chops as the monster in 1974's Young Frankenstein.
Boyle transitioned to TV in the 80s and the 90s,
including his Emmy-nominated turn as the gleefully cranky Frank Barone on
the long-running sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond. That led to a turn in the Oscar-nominated drama
Monster's Ball in 2001 before his death from multiple myeloma in 2006. He was 71.
Clarence Clemons was best known as the saxophone player in Bruce Springsteen's
E Street Band. But he also recorded several solo albums and collaborated
with dozens of other performers, including Lady Gaga, Aretha Franklin,
and Jackson Browne. He also enjoyed a second career as an actor, including a
brief appearance in Scorsese's 1977 film New York, New York as trumpet player Cecil Powell.
New York, New York was Clemons' first turn as an actor, and it led to guest star appearances
on shows like Diff'rent Strokes. In 2004, he showed off his dramatic skills on two episodes
of The Wire as a Baltimore youth program coordinator. He also memorably played One
of the Three Most Important People in the World in Bill and Ted's Excellent
Adventure. Clemons died of complications from a stroke on June 18, 2011 at the age of 69.
Theresa Saldana enjoyed a long career in movies and TV,
including playing Joe Pesci's wife in 1980's Raging Bull. But that was all
overshadowed by an incident of real-life violence that nearly left her dead.
Saldana rose to fame as a Beatles fan in 1978's I Wanna Hold Your Hand a couple of years before
Raging Bull. Two years after the latter film, she was assaulted by a deranged admirer in front
of her home in West Hollywood, California. The attacker had obtained her personal information
through a private investigator and even spoke to Saldana's mother in order to locate her address.
After four months of recovery, Saldana returned to acting, playing herself in the 1984 TV movie
Victims for Victims: The Theresa Saldana Story and earning a Golden Globe nomination as the wife of
Michael Chiklis on The Commish. She also became a dedicated activist, founding the Victims for
Victims support organization and lobbying for anti-stalking legislation. She continued to act
on TV until 2004 and then died in 2016 at the age of 61 following a hospitalization for pneumonia.
"She was an example of someone who the worst thing in the world happened to,
gathered her strength, and worked not only on behalf of herself, but on behalf of others."
1982's The King of Comedy pitted Robert De Niro's would-be stand-up comic Rupert Pupkin
against his idol, talk show host Jerry Langford, played by legendary comedian
Jerry Lewis. Lewis rose to fame in parts that showed off his knack for extreme physical humor,
but King of Comedy gave him a feature-length showcase for his considerable dramatic talents.
One of the most celebrated comic actors of the 20th century, Lewis was both a solo star and
part of a hugely popular duo act with Dean Martin. But at the height of their fame in the late 50s,
Lewis broke off on his own in a series of broadly slapstick but
carefully constructed features, like The Nutty Professor and The Bellboy.
Lewis was also the highly visible face of the Muscular Dystrophy Association, and hosted its
annual fundraising telethon from 1966 to 2010. Alas, he was also a controversial figure who
spoke disparagingly about female comics and after his death was accused of sexual misconduct by
several co-stars. He died at his home in Las Vegas on August 20, 2017 at the age of 91.
The eclectic cast of 1988's The Last Temptation of Christ included Harry Dean Stanton, David Bowie,
and Willem Dafoe as the titular messiah. A familiar face also popped up briefly as an
elderly man at a monastery visited by Jesus where a funeral for an equally venerable master took
place. The master foreshadows the vision Jesus has of his life if he hadn't been named the Messiah.
That part was played by character actor Roberts Blossom, who's perhaps best known as the lonely
Old Man Marley in 1990's Home Alone, but he also enjoyed a long career on stage and screen.
"We'll see what happens. Merry Christmas."
A veteran of World War II, Blossom worked as a therapist before landing roles in multiple
theater productions in the 60s. TV and film soon followed, for which the tall,
rangy Blossom invariably played intense men who were years or even decades beyond his
actual age. This included an inmate who cut off his own fingers in Escape from Alcatraz,
and the sinister owner of the titular car in Christine. His most alarming screen role, though,
was as a psychopath in 1974's Deranged, inspired by the crimes of real-life serial killer Ed Gein.
Home Alone, meanwhile, showcased Blossom's versatility in gentler roles. He retired
from acting after his turn in the 1995 Western The Quick and the Dead, devoting his time to
poetry instead. He died at the age of 87 on July 8, 2011 from cerebrovascular disease.
Among the actors considered for the role of Henry Hill in 1990's Goodfellas were Tom Cruise,
Sean Penn, and Alec Baldwin. However, it ultimately went to then-relative unknown
Ray Liotta, after Robert De Niro saw his harrowing turn in 1986's
Something Wild. To prepare for his Goodfellas performance, Liotta listened to the FBI's audio
recordings of Hill in order to capture his matter-of-fact delivery and accent.
"Now take me to jail."
Though perhaps best known for rough-hewn, hot-wired types like Hill and in films like
Narc and The Many Saints of Newark, Liotta played a diverse array of
characters throughout his long career. As he put it to Long Island Weekly in 2018,
"I've done movies with the Muppets. I did Sinatra [...] I did a movie with an elephant."
Other outside-the-box turns for Liotta included a flashy divorce lawyer in Marriage Story,
an FBI chief in Hannibal, a dirty police officer in Cop Land,
and a survivor of the Alamo in the miniseries Texas Rising.
Liotta worked at a breathless pace for decades, moving between features,
TV shows, and voice-over performances for animated
projects and video games. At the time of his death at the age of 67 on May 26,
2022, he had at least five posthumous films in various states of completion set to come out.
When Scorsese decided to remake the 1962 thriller Cape Fear in 1991, he paid homage to the original
film in a number of ways. Chief among these was his use of composer Bernard Herrmann's
chilling score, while he also tapped three of the original film's stars to play minor
roles in his version. Gregory Peck, who played lawyer Sam Bowden in the original,
this time played the jailhouse lawyer who helps to free Robert De Niro's Max Cady. And presiding
over the trial was Martin Balsam, who played police lieutenant Mark Dutton in the original.
And then there was Robert Mitchum, whose performance as Max Cady in the original
was selected as the 28th greatest cinematic villain of all time by the American Film
Institute. For Scorcese's version, he played the sympathetic but cagey Lieutenant Elgart,
who realized that attempts to scare off Cady with legal threats were useless.
A memorable presence in films from the 40s through the 90s,
Mitchum radiated effortless cool in a wide variety of projects, from classic noir like
Out of the Past to epic miniseries like The Winds of War. No matter what the role required,
Mitchum always delivered while also managing to seem as if the task was no big deal.
Mitchum was also a roguish presence off-screen. He famously recorded
an album of calypso music in 1957, and essentially laughed off 43 days
in prison for possession of marijuana in 1948. A heavy smoker throughout his life,
he died of emphysema and lung cancer about a month before his 80th birthday on July 1, 1997.
At the heart of Scorsese's 1993 adaptation of Edith Wharton's novel The Age of Innocence was
the stifling atmosphere of 19th century New York, where the rules of etiquette prevent its
characters from expressing their true feelings. Wharton used a love triangle to illustrate the
situation, with lawyer Newland Archer falling hopelessly in love with a divorced American
countess, yet unable to act on his feelings due to his engagement to her cousin. In the film,
Archer is thrust into the situation against his will by his employer,
Mr. Letterblair, who was played by veteran actor Norman Lloyd.
"Have you considered the consequences if the countess decides for divorce?"
Lloyd was perhaps best known to modern audiences for his long run as a doctor on St. Elsewhere,
but his career reaches back to the 1930s, when he was a member of multiple esteemed stage companies.
Appearances in the Alfred Hitchcock films Saboteur and Spellbound led to a stint as director and
associate producer of the anthology series Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Lloyd continued to act,
produce, and direct into his ninth decade, amassing credits that ranged from Dead Poets
Society to the Amy Schumer comedy Trainwreck. In 2007, his long and storied career was even
the subject of a documentary called Who is Norman Lloyd? On May 11, 2021, he died at the age of 106.
The Aviator, Scorsese's 2004 biopic of Howard Hughes, was filled with major talent in virtually
every role. Leonardo DiCaprio took the lead, Cate Blanchett played Katharine Hepburn in an
Oscar-winning turn, and the likes of Alan Alda, Alec Baldwin, and Gwen Stefani also appeared.
Also showing up briefly was Edward Herrmann as Joseph Breen, the head of the Production Code
Administration, which censored content for movies, including Hughes' notorious Western
The Outlaw. Herrmann later reunited with Scorsese for 2013's The Wolf of Wall Street,
lending his measured tones to a commercial for the fictitious brokerage firm Stratton Oakmont.
"Stratton Oakmont: Stability. Integrity. Pride."
Herrmann is probably best remembered as Lorelai Gilmore's patrician father Richard on Gilmore
Girls, but he has a long list of onscreen credits reaching back to the early 70s.
He began his career on stage before his big break in the miniseries Eleanor and Franklin,
for which he earned an Emmy nomination as President Franklin D. Roosevelt. That
turn largely cemented his reputation for playing well-to-do authority figures. He
played FDR again in the 1982 movie version of Annie, and he also played well-heeled,
slightly stuffy figures in films like Overboard and Richie Rich.
Herrmann also lent his voice to numerous commercials and documentaries, including
Ken Burns' The Roosevelts: An Intimate Series and Cancer: The Emperor of All Maladies. The
latter project was his final credit. He was suffering from the disease himself,
as he died from brain cancer at the age of 71 on December 31, 2014.
Christopher Lee didn't have a whole lot of screen time in 2011's Hugo, but his character of Monsieur
Labisse was a crucial component of the film's central mystery. A bookseller by trade, Labisse
is kind to the film's female protagonist Isabelle, lending her books that help her understand the
world around her. He later directs Isabelle and her orphan friend Hugo to the Film Academy Library
when they suspect that Isabelle's godfather is really the silent film pioneer Georges Melies.
At the time of Hugo's release, Lee was enjoying a surge of popularity even greater than his tenure
at England's Hammer Films in the 60s. That was when he played virtually every movie monster
imaginable, including Frankenstein's monster, Dracula, and the Mummy. A magnetic presence thanks
to his considerable height and distinctive voice, he was a go-to-actor for horror and
suspense for decades. But he chafed under such typecasting and headed for Hollywood in the 70s,
where he stood out in films like the James Bond flick The Man with the Golden Gun.
A generation of filmmakers who grew up with Lee's early performances were delighted by
the opportunity to cast him in their own films during the new millennium. Thus,
a pair of blockbuster franchises, Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy and George Lucas' Star
Wars prequels, introduced Lee to a whole new generation. An astonishingly prolific
actor with hundreds of film credits to his name, he remained active until 2015 while
also enjoying a surprising second career as a heavy metal recording artist. On June 7,
2015, the 93-year-old Lee died of respiratory problems and heart failure.
In Hugo, Mama Jeanne, played by Helen McCrory, is the kindly spouse of Ben Kingsley's toy store
owner Georges. And like her husband, she has a remarkable secret. She's actually Jehanne d'Alcy,
a real-life French actress and wife of director Georges Melies. She also appeared
in many of Melies' most influential films, including A Trip to the Moon.
"There are things you're too young to understand. You should not yet know such sadness."
McCrory began her career on the London stage before progressing into films and
TV. She made her screen debut with a minor role in 1994's Interview with the Vampire,
and soon moved up to supporting characters in the likes of 2002's The Count of Monte Cristo.
A turn as Prime Minister Tony Blair's wife Cherie in 2006's The Queen preceded her debut
as Narcissa Malfoy in the Harry Potter series and high-profile projects like Peaky Blinders.
McCrory also turned up in the 2012 James Bond flick Skyfall and lent her voice to
2009's Fantastic Mr. Fox. On April 16, 2021, her husband, actor Damien Lewis,
announced via social media that she'd died of breast cancer at the age of 52.
In addition to his regular lead actors like Robert De Niro, Harvey Keitel, and Leonardo DiCaprio,
Scorsese also tapped a small pool of supporting players to appear in many of his projects. One of
his earliest regular collaborators was Victor Argo, who appeared in small but notable roles
in Boxcar Bertha, Mean Streets, and Taxi Driver. After a gap of about a decade,
Argo then reunited with Scorsese for After Hours and The Last Temptation of Christ,
as well as the "Life Lessons" segment of the anthology film New York Stories.
Argo was a familiar face to filmgoers for more than three decades, thanks to character roles
in dozens of Hollywood and indie features. Director Abel Ferrara featured him in a
number of his projects, including King of New York and Bad Lieutenant, as did Woody Allen,
who tapped Argo for Crimes and Misdemeanors and Shadows and Fog. The actor also played his share
of tough guys in films like Raw Deal and True Romance, and he was also adept at sympathetic
types in the likes of 2001's Angel Eyes, which cast him as Jennifer Lopez's father.
Argo died at the age of 69 on April 7, 2004 from complications of lung cancer. Scorsese
filmed a short tribute that aired at a memorial for the actor. His description
of Argo as a wise and dependable soul was echoed by many of his fans,
and by admirers like author and film historian Richard Harland Smith, who told Looper,
"Vic rarely did better than seventh or eighth billing in the movies but
offscreen he was a star. He had a huge following in the New York theater world,
he was absolutely adored. He was generous with his company and his time. He loved to work,
to workshop new stuff, even if he wouldn't get paid for it,
and he loved to encourage underrepresented talent. He made us all feel important."