Arts
Actor James Earl Jones, whose voice had the ability to intimidate or soothe, passes away at the age of 93
He gave life to characters like Darth Vader in “Star Wars” and Mufasa in “The Lion King,” and went on to collect Tonys, Golden Globes, Emmys and an honorary Oscar.
Updated 2024-Oct-05 01:00
Jones wearing glasses and looking away from the camera with a serious expression on his face. A black and white portrait of Mr.
However his extended period with Fences in 1987 and 1988 which included a tour across the country was too demanding.
He stayed away from Broadway for a long time and focused mainly on making movies. Some of his memorable film parts were as a mistreated coal miner in John Sayles s Matewan 1987 a monarch of an imaginary African country in the John Landis comedy Coming to America 1988 a role he revisited at age 90 in 2021 in Coming 2 America a resentful yet determined writer in the baseball film Field of Dreams 1989 and a South African clergyman in Cry the Beloved Country 1995.Jones was honored with prestigious awards from President George Bush the Kennedy Center an honorary Oscar and a special Tony Award for lifetime achievement.
A black and white portrait of a young James Earl Jones sitting on a wooden bench and leaning forward and smiling with his hands on his left knee.
He also received an honorary doctor of arts degree from Harvard University. In 2015 Jones and Cicely Tyson starred in a Broadway revival of The Gin Game.
Jones who is 84 years old had his sixth Broadway role in the last ten years as reported by The Times.
In 2022 the Cort Theater on Broadway which has been around for 110 years was renamed the James Earl Jones Theater.
James Earl Jones a stuttering farm child who became a voice of rolling thunder as one of America’s most versatile actors in a stage film and television career that plumbed race relations Shakespeare’s rhapsodic tragedies and the faceless menace of Darth Vader died on Monday at his home in Dutchess County N.Y. He was 93. The office of his agent Barry McPherson confirmed the death in a statement. From destitute days working in a diner and living in a $19 a month cold water flat Mr.Jones climbed to Broadway and Hollywood stardom with talent drive and remarkable vocal cords. He was abandoned as a child by his parents raised by a racist grandmother and mute for years in his stutterer’s shame but he learned to speak again with a herculean will.
All had much to do with his success. So did plays by Howard Sackler and August Wilson that let a young actor explore racial hatred in the national experience television soap operas that boldly cast a Black man as a doctor in the 1960s and a decision by George Lucas the creator of Star Wars to put an anonymous rumbling African American voice behind the grotesque mask of the galactic villain Vader.
ImageMr. Jones in 1979 as the author Alex Haley on Roots: The Next Generation. Credit. Warner Brothers Television via Everett Collection.
Reporting was done by Alex Traub. Jones joined a drama group at the University of Michigan while studying pre med with a scholarship.
He became increasingly interested in acting and changed his major to focus on drama at the university s School of Music Theater and Dance.
In his memoir he mentioned that he dropped out of college in 1953 before returning to complete his remaining coursework.
In 1955 he graduated with a drama degree. Additionally while in college he enlisted in the Army.
