WESTON, CT (CelebrityAccess) — Christopher Plummer, an Oscar-winning actor of stage and screen, who starred Sound of Music, Beginners, and The Thornbirds, died at his home in Connecticut. He was 91.
His wife, Elaine Taylor, told the New York Times that Plummer died after suffering a head injury as the result of a fall.
Plummer won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in 2011 for his turn as Hal Fields in the romantic comedy The Beginners, who at 82, become the oldest actor to do so. His accolades also include multiple Tony, and Primetime Emmy Awards, as well as a Grammy for Best Recording for Children in 1986 for reading an audio version of The Nutcracker.
A native of Toronto, Plummer developed a taste for performing at an early age and began acting while still attending high school in Montreal, where he caught the attention of Montreal Gazette’s theatre critic Herbert Whittaker, who cast an 18-year-old Plummer as Oedipus in Jean Cocteau’s “La Machine Infernale.”
Plummer made his Broadway debut in January 1953 in “The Starcross Story,” however, the show was poorly received and closed after just one performance.
In 1965, Plummer was cast as Captain von Trapp in the cinematic smash hit musical The Sound of Music, which became the highest grossing film of its era. His other notable films include The Man Who Would Be King (1975), “The Battle of Waterloo” (1970), “The Insider” (1999), and “A Beautiful Mind” (2001). More recently, he appeared in “The Forger,” “Remember,” “The Exception,” “Boundaries” and “The Last Full Measure.”
In addition to the stage and screen, Plummer was a regular on television as well, appearing in more than 100 shows, including the Emmy-nominated miniseries “The Thornbirds,” “Arthur Hailey’s The Moneychangers,” and provided voice work for the animated “The New Adventures of Madeline.”
