http://abcnews.go.com/wire/Entertainment/ap20030831_1249.html
I liked Telefon and The Mechanic. He was also in a Twilight Zone with Elizabeth Montgomery.
Holy cow…if he was 81 that means he was over 50 when he did all those studly action movies in the 70s.
Wow, that’s a shame! I wouldn’t have guessed he was that old either. The Mechanic was a great B+ movie! What an ending!
Eve’s going to be mad you scooped her. 
Shit. Eve, your name deserves to be “bolded”.
First, the Magnificent Seven! Then the Great Escape! Then The Dirty Dozen. He was an outstanding ensemble action-movie actor.
I’ll miss the man since I enjoyed so many of his movies, may have to watch Death Hunt, Once Upon A Time In The West, House Of Wax, or Hard Times in his memory. I hope they released some of his underappreciated films on DVD soon like The Stone Killer or From Noon Till Three.
Whenever I want to show how in shape the guy was I tell people to look at him in Chato’s Land which came out around the time he was 50 or Hard Times filmed in 1974 when he was 52. Lean and mean, and looked as hard as nails.
Grim silver lining for me, he’s one of my SDMB Death Pool picks.
He proves the old adage, be careful what you wish for!
Seriously, though, one of the greats leaves the stage. Godspeed, Chuck…Timmy
Well, he made a lot of embarrassingly bad movies, but his best work holds up very well.
Topping the list: “Once Upon a Time in the West.” Talk about counterintuitive casting! Who but Sergio Leone would have thought to make Charles Bronson the hero and Henry Fonda the embodiment of pure evil? But it worked beautifully.
Odd factoid: Some years back, I saw an interview in which Bronson reminisced about the days when he and another struggling actor were roommates. This roommate used to wash his socks and underwear in the kitchen sink and leave them to dry on the windowsills!
As Paul Harvey would say, the rest of sthe story is… that roommate’s name was Jack Klugman! And Bronson concluded by saying, “Years later, when I heard that Jack got the role of Oscar Madison in The Odd Couple, I thought, boy, they sure got the right man for THAT role!”
Well put. Some of those movies he was in in the 60’s were some of the best movies ever made. I remember when he came to Milwaukee to make a few films. He received some well deserved hoopla.
Point of interest: My Concealed Weapons Permit from the state of Florida is signed by the state licensing commissioner: Charles Bronson. I always thought it humorous that the guy handing out gun carry permits was named that.
Announcer: Now, let’s take a look at a young Charles Bronson’s brief stint replacing Andy Griffith in “The Andy Griffith Show”.
Barney: Where’s Otis? He’s not in his cell.
Bronson: I shot him.
Barney: Well that’s… what?!
Bronson: And now, I’m going down to Emmett’s Fix-It Shop. [cocks gun] To fix Emmett.
So does this mean he had a Death Wish?!
[sub]sorry[/sub]
This sounds suspiciously like an early-morning radio bit that was played in the louisville, KY area on WQMF. Except that it had Clint Eatwood as Andy. And they also had a series with Clint Eastwood as Theodore “Beaver” Cleaver.
On-topic, I was never a huge Western fan, and never really watched Bronson. But I have an appreciation for him. My dad loved him. I miss my dad. Therefore, I’ll miss Bronson’s impact.
That was actually from the Simpsons.
I never really noticed Bronson as a actor, but I did read wife Jill Ireland’s two books “Life Wish” and “Life Line.” Very good insite into Bronson, her battle with breast cancer, her father’s strokes and general ill health, and her adopted son Jason’s drug battle that eventually killed him.
Did he do anything beside act?
I cannot (yet) find his obit on-line.
Eh. It was bound to happen.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/Movies/08/31/bronson.obit/index.html
CNN obit.
Just to set the record straight on his children: Suzanne & Tony parents were Bronson and his first wife Harriet. Zulieka was the child of Bronson and second wife JIll Ireland. Katrina was the child of Jill’s friend Hillary Holden. She died when Katrina was 14, and the Bronson’s just took her in, but never formally adopted her (her paternity is never discussed in Jill’s books). Paul and Valentine were Jill’s sons by first husband David McCallum. An adopted son with McCallum, Jason, died of a drug overdose.
Hey, how about the great moment in House of Wax when the hero (or heroine, I forget) innocently walks past a shelf of wax heads. But one of them is Charles Bronson.
Damn… out of all those tough guy actors in The Magnificent Seven and The Wild Bunch, only Ernest Borgnine exists to carry the torch. They just don’t make guys like that anymore (no, Vin Diesel doesn’t count).
Yes it is sad that Charles Bronson is gone.
I thought he was a good actor and it is hard to believe that he wasn’t considered a “star” until after the “Spaghetti Western” Era. “Magnificent Seven”, “Great Escpae” and the “Dirty Dozen” - sheesh isn’t that enough to be considered a star?
Perhaps my favorite Charles Bronson role was John Strock in “Master of the World” (also starring Vincent Price). In one scene he gives his word to Vincent Price (who is seeking world conquest) that he will not try to stop him. Another character named Mr Evans (who is filled with 19th century phony chivalry) tells him that when a gentleman gives his word it should be the truth, etc.
Charles Bronson’s reply - “What should I have done? Proclaimed in riniging gentlemanly tones that I would defy him until my dying breath? Well believe me Mr Evans, that dying breath would have been shortly forthcoming. It was risk enough not joining forces with him. At least then I could have learned his weaknesses. Now I must work in the dark. Somewhat less than a gentleman, but at least I am alive to do so.”
Perhaps that is not the role that comes to mind when people think of Charles Bronson, but just read that quote with Charles Bronson’s inflection and you can see that role was really made for him.
Also, I hope I age as well as Mr Bronson did. As widdershins and torgo have mentioned, he was making action movies in his fifties and beyond and still looked pretty damned good.
“Breakheart Pass” (although not his best movie) has a great action sequence in which he is struggling with an enemy *on top of a moving train * all the while the train is passing over a ravine!! And Mr Bronson made this when he was 54 !!
Yep, they don’t make 'em like that anymore.
Another one bites the dust.
Thank you Mr. Bronson for making hollywood enjoyable. Another one gone.