Oscar-winning actor Jack Palance dead at 87

Posted:
Nov 10, 2006

Craggy-faced actor Jack Palance, who took on villainous roles in such films as Shane and Sudden Fear, then made an Oscar-winning comedic turn at 70 in City Slickers, died Friday.

Associated Press records suggested that Palance was 85, but Palance actually was 87, according to the family. He died of natural causes at his Montecito, California home, surrounded by family, spokesman Dick Guttman said.

Palance provided the voice of Lord Rothbart in the 1994 animated feature film The Swan Princess, co-produced by Rich Animation Studios and Nest Entertainment.The film was nominated for an Annie for Best Animated Feature and an Artios for Best Casting for Animated Voiceover.

He was born Vladimir Palaniuk on February 18, 1919 in Lattimer Mines, Pennsylvania. Of Ukrainian origin, he was the son of a coal miner.

In the early 1940s, Palance was a professional heavyweight boxer, fighting under the name Jack Brazzo. He won his first 15 fights (12 by knockout) before losing a fourth- round decision to future heavyweight contender Joe Baksi on December 17, 1940.

When the Second World War broke out, Palance entered the military. He burned his face severely while bailing out of a B-24 which was on fire during a training flight in Tucson in 1942. After several surgeries, he was discharged in 1944. Palance received the Purple Heart, the Good Conduct Medal and the World War II Victory Medal.

Attending the University of North Carolina, he graduated from Stanford University in 1949 with a B.A. in Drama.

In his early years as a would-be actor, he also worked as a short order cook, waiter, soda jerk, lifeguard at Jones Beach, and a photographer's model.

An understudy to Marlon Brando in the Broadway production of A Streetcar Named Desire, Palance went on for Brando when he accidentally hit Marlon with a punching bag during athletic practice. Palance's reviews as Stanley Kowalski helped get him a 20th Century-Fox contract.

Palance went on to win the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for City Slickers (1991) and wowed the audience at the Academy Awards by doing a series of one-handed push-ups on stage. Asked later about the performance, he replied, "I didn't know what the hell else to do." In The Swan Princess, Palance's animated character was featured doing one-handed push-ups.

His City Slickers supporting performance also won him a Golden Globe and an American Comedy Award.

Decades earlier, he had been nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor two years in a row: for Sudden Fear (1952) and Shane (1953).

In 1957, he won an Emmy for Best Single Performance by an Actor for Requiem for a Heavyweight, an episode of the acclaimed series Playhouse 90.

He had three children with his first wife, Virginia Baker, whom he married in 1949. They divorced in 1966.

His only son, Cody, died in 1998 at 42.

Jack Palance is survived by Elaine Rogers, his wife since 1987, and by daughters Holly and Brooke Palance. With her father, Holly Palance hosted the TV series Ripley's Believe It or Not!, which ran from 1982 to 1986.