Well, this is a bummer. The great Louis Gossett Jr., star of An Officer and a Gentleman, Roots, Diggstown, Jaws 3D, Iron Eagle, and so many more classics, has died at age 87. According to his obit in THR, no cause of death was immediately revealed, but the actor was treated for prostate cancer in 2010, and also battled COVID-19 back in 2020.
If you grew up in the eighties and nineties, Louis Gossett Jr was one of those faces you saw everywhere. He was in high demand as a character actor, winning an Oscar for playing Richard Gere’s tough but compassionate drill instructor in An Officer and a Gentleman. If you haven’t seen that movie in a while or remember it as a sappy romantic drama, I’d urge you to watch it again. It’s actually a pretty gritty, R-rated drama, and it climaxes with a nifty martial arts battle between Gossett and Gere, which is capped off by one of the most brutal crotch kicks (delivered by Gossett to Gere) I’ve ever seen in a movie.
While Gossett had been in plenty of stuff before (including Roots), the Oscar win really kicked his career into high gear. He immediately became in demand, with him having a blast chewing some scenery in Jaws 3D opposite Dennis Quaid. He became a leading man in his own right thanks to the Iron Eagle films, in which he played Chappy Sinclair, an Air Force pilot who, in the first film, helps a teen rescue his shot-down pilot father (check out our tribute to it here). Gossett became a mainstay of these films, starring in no less than three sequels. He also co-starred with Dolph Lundgren in the first Punisher movie, was one of the leads in the cult teen action flick Toy Soldiers, and most recently turned up on HBO’s Watchmen series, as well as the Color Purple remake. He also did a voice role for John Krasinski’s IF, which will be released posthumously.
Here’s an interesting piece of trivia for you. Louis Gossett Jr once saved someone’s life. In the early eighties, he co-starred in a short-lived series called The Powers of Matthew Star. The show’s young star, Peter Barton, fell onto a magnesium flare, and Gossett, who was tied to a chair in the scene they were shooting, managed to somehow rescue him by falling on top of him, sustaining some burns himself in the attempt. Pretty cool, huh?
While his passing is indeed very sad news, Gossett leaves behind an incredible legacy of performances we here at JoBlo will never forget. Rest in peace good sir.