Frtiz Weaver obit

Fritz Weaver, Tony-Winning Character Actor, Dies at 90

 

He was not on the list.

Fritz Weaver, a Tony Award-winning character actor who played a German Jewish doctor slain by the Nazis in the 1978 mini-series “Holocaust” and an Air Force colonel who becomes increasingly unstable as the nation faces a nuclear crisis in the 1964 movie “Fail Safe,” died on Saturday at his home in Manhattan. He was 90.

His death was confirmed by his son-in-law, Bruce Ostler.

Mr. Weaver won a Tony in 1970 for his role in Robert Marasco’s drama “Child’s Play,” about the malevolent environment at an exclusive Roman Catholic school for boys.

Mr. Weaver and Pat Hingle played teachers of wildly different temperaments who inevitably became adversaries. Mr. Weaver was the fierce disciplinarian, Mr. Hingle his easygoing rival.

But winning the Tony did not catapult Mr. Weaver into stardom. “What I remember is a vast silence from the phone,” he said, “because people said, ‘We won’t offer it, now, because we can’t offer him enough money.’ ”

From the 1950s on, Mr. Weaver was a familiar presence on television shows like “Studio One,” “Playhouse 90,” “Mission: Impossible” and “Murder, She Wrote.”

He appeared in two episodes of “The Twilight Zone” — “The Obsolete Man” and “Third From the Sun,” in which he played a scientist who plots to take his family aboard a rocket to escape their planet before a nuclear war.

He was nominated for an Emmy for his performance in the NBC mini-series “Holocaust,” playing Dr. Josef Weiss, the patriarch of a Jewish family who is denied his livelihood, is sent to the Warsaw ghetto and then to Auschwitz to die.

Mr. Weaver made his Broadway debut in 1955 in “The Chalk Garden,” Enid Bagnold’s play about the woes of an aristocratic British family. He won laughs and a Tony nomination with his portrait of the fussy household butler.

A review in The Boston Globe said: “Mr. Weaver boasts sound basic equipment; a natural ease on the stage, aristocratic good looks and a resonant baritone, which he attributes to a family line that boasts a number of opera singers.”

He went on to appear in a revival of Eugene O’Neill’s “The Great God Brown” (1959) and the Phoenix Theatre’s 1960 staging of Shakespeare’s “Henry IV,” in which he starred as the world-weary British monarch.

His other Shakespearean roles included Hamlet, King Lear and Macbeth. For the latter role, The New York Times said in 1973, Mr. Weaver was almost unrecognizable, having been transformed from a “thin, fine-drawn, long-fingered” figure into a “robust, burly Macbeth.’’

His theater credits also included the 1979 revival of Arthur Miller’s “The Price”; Lanford Wilson’s “A Tale Told” (1981), part three of a trilogy about a feuding Missouri family, in which he played the clan patriarch with what Frank Rich in The Times called “an often startling mixture of pathetic senility and foxy viciousness”; and Mr. Wilson’s “Angels Fall” (1982).

In later years Mr. Weaver turned increasingly to voice-over work, serving as narrator of, among other specials, “The Rape of Nanking” (1999) and “Unsung Heroes of Pearl Harbor” (2001), as well as many shows on the History Channel.

One of his last roles was in the 2015 Adam Sandler film “The Cobbler.” He also appeared in the 2016 film “The Congressman,” starring Treat Williams.

Fritz William Weaver was born on Jan. 19, 1926, in Pittsburgh, the son of John Carson Weaver and the former Elsa Stringaro.

After graduating from the University of Chicago, where he majored in physics, he came to New York and enrolled in acting classes at the Herbert Berghof Studio. In 1954 he made his Off Broadway debut in “The Way of the World” at the Cherry Lane Theater.

His first marriage, to Sylvia Short, ended in divorce. He married the actress Rochelle Oliver in 1997. She survives him, as do his daughter, Lydia Weaver; his son, Anthony; and a grandson.

Mr. Weaver was often cast as an aristocratic villain. In “The Day of the Dolphin” (1973), directed by Mike Nichols, he played the head of a shadowy company supporting researchers (George C. Scott and Trish Van Devere) who are studying dolphin intelligence. His sinister goal was to use trained dolphins to attach explosives to the presidential yacht.

He also appeared in the movies “Marathon Man” (1976), “Demon Seed” (1977), “Creepshow” (1982) and “The Thomas Crown Affair” (1999).

In a 1988 interview with The Christian Science Monitor, Mr. Weaver spoke about the challenges actors face.

“When you play the great roles, you get spoiled and think you’ll have a whole career playing nothing but great roles, and of course you can’t,’’ he said. “You play a lot of junk most of the time. Television is junk, most of it.”

But he reveled in performing Shakespearean roles.

“The old boy — he’s the one who makes the maximum challenge to the actor,’’ he said of Shakespeare. “That high charge on all the lines that he writes — you’ve got to measure up. You can’t just saunter into that stuff; you’ve got to bring your whole life into it.”

Select filmography

Film

 

    To Trap a Spy (1964) – Andrew Vulcan (archive footage)

    Fail Safe (1964) – Colonel Cascio

    The Borgia Stick (1967) – Anderson

    The Maltese Bippy (1969) – Mischa Ravenswood

    A Walk in the Spring Rain (1970) – Roger Meredith

    The Day of the Dolphin (1973) – Harold DeMilo

    The Legend of Lizzie Borden (1975) – Andrew Borden

    Marathon Man (1976) – Professor Biesenthal

    Black Sunday (1977) – Corley

    Demon Seed (1977) – Alex Harris

    Captains Courageous (1977) – Harvey Cheyne Sr.

    The Big Fix (1978) – Oscar Procari Sr.

    Martian Chronicles (1980) – Father Peregrine

    Nightkill (1980) – Herbert Childs

    Jaws of Satan (1981) – Father Tom Farrow

    Creepshow (1982) – Dexter Stanley (segment "The Crate")

    Power (1986) – Wallace Furman

    The Thomas Crown Affair (1999) – John Reynolds

    This Must Be the Place (2011) – Cheyenne's Father (voice)

    Muhammad Ali's Greatest Fight (2013) – Hugo Black

    We'll Never Have Paris (2014) – Phillipe

    The Cobbler (2014) – Mr. Solomon

    The Congressman (2016) – Harlan Lantier (final film role)

 

Television

 

    Beyond This Place (1957) – Charlie Castle

    Way Out (1961, Episode: "William and Mary") – Dr. Landy

    The Twilight Zone (1961, Episodes: "Third from the Sun" / "The Obsolete Man") – William Sturka / Chancellor

    The Asphalt Jungle (1961) – Victor Vanda

    Dr. Kildare (1963) – Arthur Hobler

    The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1964) – Andrew Vulcan

    Twelve O'Clock High (1964) – Col. Peter Raff

    Rawhide (1964) – Jonathan Damon

    The Fugitive (1966, Season 3 Episode 28 "A Taste Of Tomorrow") – Joe Tucker

    Combat! (1966) – Major Chaplain Ernest Miller

    Gunsmoke (1967) – Marshal Burl Masters

    The Invaders (1967, Episode 30 "The Captive") – Deputy Ambassador Peter Borke

    The Big Valley (1967–1969) – Hebron Grant / Burke Jordan

    Cannon (1971) – "The Nowhere Man"

    Night Gallery (1971) – Dr. Mazi (segment "A Question of Fear")

    Mission: Impossible (1966–1971) – George Berlinger / Emil Skarbeck / Erik Hagar / Imre Rogosh

    Mannix (1968–1973) – William Avery / Dr. Cameron McKenzie

    Kung Fu (1974) – Hillquist

    Great Performances (1974) – Creon (Antigone)

    The New Land (1974, Episode: "The Word is: Giving" – unaired)

    The Streets Of San Francisco (1975) – Ted Whitlock

    Wonder Woman (1977) – Dr. Solano

    Holocaust (1978) – Dr. Josef Weiss

    Hawaii Five-O (1979) – Dr. Harvey Danworth

    The Martian Chronicles (1980) – Father Peregrine

    Magnum, P.I. (1980) – Captain J. Cooly, USN

    Don't Eat the Pictures (1983) – Osiris

    Tales from the Darkside (Episodes: "Comet Watch" (1986), "Inside the Closet" (1984)) – Sir Edmund Halley / Dr. Fenner

    Murder, She Wrote (1984–1987) – Paris Inspector Hugues Panassié / Edwin Dupont / Judge Lambert

    The Twilight Zone (1985, Episode 13; segment "The Star") – Father Matthew Karsighan

    Dream West (1986) – Sen. Thomas Hart Benton

    I'll Take Manhattan (1987) – Mr. Amberville

    Friday the 13th: The Series (1989, in the two-part episode of the third-season opener named "The Prophecies") – Asteroth

    Matlock (1989) – Pastor James Hubert

    All My Children (1992) – Hugo Marick

    Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1994, S2:E25 "Tribunal") – Kovat

    The X-Files (1996) – Senator Albert Sorenson

    Frasier (1998) – Sir Trevor Ainsley

    Law & Order (1991–2005) – Nathan Fogg / Larry Weber / Philip Woodleigh