River Phoenix was in the middle of filming two productions when he died: Dark Blood, which was abandoned, and Interview with the Vampire, which was recast with Christian Slater instead.
Yeah, Robo-Livia was horrible. I wish they had filmed some deathbed scenes in advance, since Nancy Marchand had terminal lung cancer and everyone knew she wasn’t going to last much longer, it wasn’t like an unexpected heart attack or drug overdose or something…but noooo.
As I always seem to wind up mentioning in such threads, the much loved British comic actor Roy Kinnear died after falling off a horse during the shoot for The Return of the Musketeers. There was a messy aftermath, with a court case about responsibility and Richard Lester, his friend and the film’s director, retiring as a result of the accident.
Although he died after the movie was completed,Peter Finch one of the stars of the movie “Network,” died while on a promotional tour for the film. He was posthumously nominated, and awarded the Best Actor Academy Award. He was not the first to be nominated posthumously, but he was the first posthumous Oscar-winner.
Jean Harlow collapsed on the set of the film Saratoga and died about a week later due to kidney failure. Her role was about 90% complete, so they used her stand-in and shot the scenes from the back, with another actress supplying the voice.
Thelma Todd died from carbon monoxide poisoning in her garage. She had three films completed at the time, but her death was so controversial that they reshot one of them to reduce her role.
I guess we can expand this to tv shows as well. John Ritter comes to mind. Any others? And how did they deal with the death on the show?
The death of Roger Delgado, most known as the original Master from Doctor Who, scuppered the film Bell Of Tibet.
My husband was a speaking extra in the TV production of "Pudd’nhead Wilson " that starred Ken Howard.
One of the actors had a heart attack and died on set. He was the main character in the one scene my husband had lines in. My husband’s big scene ended up on the cutting room floor, so to speak.
He said the whole company was very freaked out and upset by the actor’s death.
I tried looking through the IMDB full cast and crew list to see if there were any clues as to who it was, but there are several actors whose only or last credit was that particular production.
Are you sure about this? It’s one of my favorite films. I believe John Candy’s character is still alive at the end.
David Rappaport committed suicide during the filming of the great ST:NG episode “The Most Toys”: The Most Toys - Wikipedia
He was replaced by Saul Rubinek, who really took ownership of the role.
Paul Douglas died during the filming of the Twilight Zone episode “The Might Casey”:"The Twilight Zone" The Mighty Casey (TV Episode 1960) - IMDb
He was replaced by Jack Warden.
Tyrone Power died during the filming of ‘Solomon and Sheba.’ His scenes were reshot with Yul Brynner cast as the new Solomon.
Of course, TV opens many avenues. But it’s usually different: there’s usually a chance to write it into the script.
For instance, Barney Miller dealt with the death of Jack Soo by having a special retrospective of his work.
Cheers dealt with the death of Nick Colasante by setting things several months later (he died during the hiatus) and merely saying that Coach had died a few months previously. I actually liked that; you got the feeling that there had been grieving, but it was offstage.
Michael Conrad died during the run of Hill Street Blues. His role on the show was reduced due to his illness for several episode, and I believe his death was written into the script.
Oliver Reed died during the filming of Gladiator, and iirc, they cobbled together the final scene with him from earlier footage, including the “ashes and dust” quote…
S^G
If we are talking TV, remember Josh Ryan Evans who played Timmy on Passions? Due to his illness (I think he had a heart condition or something, but I don’t remember if it had something to do with whatever caused his dwarfism), they had reduced his screen-time. The episode where his character died was aired on the same day that he died in real life. The plan had been to have his character come back as an angel or Tabitha’s conscience or something like that. They had filmed one or two scenes, which were used much later.
I wasn’t even watching Passions anymore at the time, but did tune in for that. How sad!
John-Erik Hexum Jon-Erik Hexum - IMDb died (of terminal foolishness) during production of cover up.
Redd Foxx died during production of The Royal Family. He was written out as having died.
Peter Deuel died (apparently by suicide) while starring in Alias Smith and Jones. His role was recast.
David Strickland also committed suicide during his run on Suddenly Susan. His role was written out.
The show Phyllis was really snakebitten. Barbara Colby was murdered after filming the first episode. Her part was recast. Judith Lowery died after filiming an episode where she married Burt Mustin, but before it aired. Mustin died shortly after it aired.
John Spencer in The West Wing.
Diana Hyland played mother Joan Bradford on “Eight is Enough.” She died after filming four episodes of Eight is Enough. They made Tom Bradford a widower and later brought in Betty Buckley as Sandra Sue “Abby” Abbott, who he later married on the show.
It was a laugh, like watching a spider with half its legs missing trying to swat a fly.
Also of note, the scene where “Bruce” speaks to someone in front of a mirror.
It also prompted one of the Doctor’s to leave the show, Pertwee IIRC.
Wasn’t some footage of him CGI too?
Poltergeist 3 had to use a stand in for the re-shoots of the ending after Heather O’Rourke died.