Legendary actor James Earl Jones, best known for his countless film roles and the booming voice of the character Darth Vader in the “Star Wars” franchise, has died, his spokesman confirmed to ABC News.
He was 93 years old.
According to his longtime agent Barry McPherson, Jones died Monday morning at his home in Dutchess County, New York, surrounded by his family.
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The actor, whose powerful, deep voice brought iconic villain Darth Vader to life, acted for more than six decades and won three Tony Awards, including one for lifetime achievement in 2017, two Emmys and a Grammy. He received a lifetime achievement award at the 2011 Academy Awards.
Jones was born in Mississippi in 1931 and was known to suffer from severe stuttering as a child.
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“People would come to my house and be introduced, but I couldn’t introduce myself,” he told PBS in 2014 about how bad the disease was at the time. Jones said he learned to stay silent for long periods of time.
“I found that sometimes it was so good because silence is not bad. Listening is good. And I learned to listen,” Jones told PBS.
It was Jones’ stuttering that drew him to acting after a high school teacher helped him improve his pronunciation through poetry. After college and the Army, where he served in the Korean War, Jones considered Broadway as a starting point for theater and the arts.
Jones was a fixture on Broadway in the 1950s and 1960s. He was nominated for a Tony four times for his plays, from On Golden Pond to The Best Man. He won the Tony in 1969 for The Great White Hope and in 1987 for Fences.
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Almost simultaneously, he also gained recognition in television. The later two-time Emmy winner received his first nomination in the 1960s for his work on “East Side/West Side.”
He won both Primetime Emmys in 1991 for Best Supporting Actor in the miniseries “Heat Wave” and Best Actor in the series “Gabriel’s Fire.” He also won a Daytime Emmy in 2000 for the children’s show “Summer’s End.”
Jones later received his first Oscar nomination when he adapted The Great White Hope for the screen in 1970, playing boxer Jack Jefferson. Jones was only the second black actor to be nominated by the Academy, after Sidney Poitier, who was nominated in 1958 and 1963.
Jones spent most of the 1970s continuing to work on stage, television and in the movies. In 1977, he was cast as the voice of a new villain, Darth Vader, in the space saga Star Wars: A New Hope.
While bodybuilder David Prowse was the figure behind the Sith Lord’s black mask, Jones was the voice that uttered so many iconic lines in the film and its sequels – including “I find your lack of faith disturbing” and then, of course, the big reveal to Luke Skywalker in the 1980s film The Empire Strikes Back: “No, I am your father.”
Jones was always conscious of the fact that he could be the voice of such an iconic opponent.
“I’m just special effects,” he told the American Film Institute in 2009 about the role he lent to a character physically played by someone else. “George (Lucas) wanted, excuse the expression, a darker voice, so he hired a guy who was born in Mississippi and raised in Michigan and stutters. That’s the voice, that’s me. I was lucky. Despite all these so-called handicaps, I was lucky to get a job that paid me $7,000, and I thought that was good money.”
In a 2004 documentary called Star Wars: Empire of Dreams, Jones talked about how he first learned that Vader, the villain of the film trilogy, would reveal to him that he was the long-lost father of Skywalker, the main hero.
“I said to myself, ‘He’s lying,'” Jones admitted. “I wonder how they’re going to portray this lie.”
But that wasn’t a lie. The three original Star Wars films, made between 1977 and 1983, were among the most admired and original films of their time, not only for their special effects but also for their shocking storylines and themes.
After Star Wars, Jones made memorable appearances in Eddie Murphy’s 1988 film Coming to America and starred opposite Kevin Costner in 1989’s Field of Dreams. A few years later, he again lent his voice to a famous character, playing the role of Mufasa in the Disney animated film The Lion King.
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Jones has nearly 200 credits to his name, according to IMDB, having been active for more than 60 years, including in films such as “The Sandlot,” series such as “Dr. House” and “The Simpsons,” and his return to a galaxy far, far away in 2004’s “Revenge of the Sith.” He has returned to voice Vader several times in recent years, including in the animated series “Rebels,” “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” (2016), “The Rise of Skywalker” (2019), and the Disney+ series “Obi-Wan Kenobi” (2022).
He also reprised his role in the 2021 sequel to Coming to America: The First Prince of Zamunda, Coming to America: The First Prince of Zamunda.
In 2011, Jones received an honorary Oscar for the breadth of his acclaimed work.
When Jones starred in Driving Miss Daisy in London in 2011, he was surprised by his co-star Vanessa Redgrave, who waited until the end of the show to share his honor with the audience that year. The cast and Academy held a special ceremony for Jones onstage, where Sir Ben Kingsley came out to present Jones with his Oscar.
“If it’s an actor’s nightmare to be naked on stage and not know your lines, what the hell do you call it?” he said of the surprise honor. “How do I feel? Well, beyond stunned. … That’s the only word I can think of for this improbable moment in my life.”
In March 2022, it was announced that the Cort Theatre on Broadway would be renamed the James Earl Jones Theatre.
Jones was married twice. His second wife, Cecilia Hart, died in 2016 after 34 years of marriage. The couple is survived by their son, Flynn Earl Jones.
Legendary actor James Earl Jones has died at the age of 93. Originally published on abcnews.go.com
