Veteran character actor Yaphet Kotto has sadly passed away at the age of 81.
His wife, Tessie Sinahon, confirmed the news late last night. "I'm saddened and still in shocked of the passing of my husband Yaphet of 24 years," she wrote in a Facebook post.
Since making his big-screen debut with an uncredited role in the Rat Pack film 4 for Texas in 1963, Kotto has given memorable performances in the likes of Live and Let Die, Blue Collar, Brubaker, The Running Man, and Midnight Run. He was nominated for an Emmy for his portrayal of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin in Raid on Entebbe in 1976.
Of course, he will be best known to sci-fi fans for playing the Nostromo's badass chief engineer Parker in Ridley Scott's Alien.
Kotto famously turned down the chance to play both Lando Calrissian in The Empire Strikes Back, and Jean Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation.
"I wanted to get back down on Earth," he said in a 2003 interview when asked why he passed on joining the galaxy far, far away. "I was afraid that if I did another space film after having done Alien, then I'd be typed.
Once you get one of those big blockbuster hits, you better have some other big blockbuster hits to go with it too and be Harrison Ford, because if you don't … you place yourself right out of the business."
Rest in power Mr. Kotto... we hope the coffee's good up there.
About The Author:
Mark Cassidy is a writer, photographer, amateur filmmaker, and Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic from Dublin, Ireland.