R.I.P.: Robert Forster has passed away at age 78

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Sad news broke over the weekend with the announcement that prolific actor Robert Forster passed away on Friday, October 11th, after a short battle with brain cancer. The day he passed away also happened to be the same day his latest movie, EL CAMINO: A BREAKING BAD MOVIE, was released through the Netflix streaming service.

Born in 1941, Forster started acting in college when he followed the woman he would end up marrying into the auditorium and was given a part in a production of Bye Bye Birdie. His film debut came along in 1967, and he got his start sharing the screen with a couple of the biggest stars in Hollywood – his first movie was REFLECTIONS IN A GOLDEN EYE, starring Marlon Brando and Elizabeth Taylor.

Forster worked steadily from that point on, with some notable credits from the early years of his career including the Western THE STALKING MOON; a couple short-lived TV shows, Banyon and Nakia; Haskell Wexler's MEDIUM COOL, which was filmed in the midst of the chaos of the 1968 Democratic National Convention; and the popular Disney sci-fi movie THE BLACK HOLE.

He earned a lot of fans in the horror community with his role as the hero in 1980's ALLIGATOR, and through the '80s and into the '90s he appeared in such film and television projects as William Lustig's VIGILANTE; Magnum, P.I.; the Chuck Norris movie THE DELTA FORCE; Tales from the Darkside; SATAN'S PRINCESS; Kevin S. Tenney's PEACEMAKER; MANIAC COP 3: BADGE OF SILENCE; SCANNER COP II; Larry Cohen's ORIGINAL GANGSTAS; UNCLE SAM; and the Corey Haim action flick DEMOLITION UNIVERSITY.

Forster was getting jobs, but his career was running on fumes at that point. As he told the Chicago Tribune, 

Every time it reached a lower level I thought I could tolerate, it dropped some more, and then some more. Near the end I had no agent, no manager, no lawyer, no nothing. I was taking whatever fell through the cracks."

And then came a career resurgence thanks to Quentin Tarantino, who cast Forster in a major role in his 1997 film JACKIE BROWN. It was a better showcase of Forster's talents than he had gotten in a long time, and he even earned a Best Actor in a Supporting Role Oscar nomination for his performance. I'll admit, JACKIE BROWN is when I first noticed Forster. I had seen him in movies before that, but not in a role so prominent and not with such strong material to work with. With his performance in that movie, Robert Forster became one of my favorite actors.

When his career was at its lowest point, Forster came to the realization that, 

'You know what? You're not dead yet, Bob. You can win it in the late innings. You've still got the late innings, but you can't quit. Never quit.'"

And he did win in the late innings. He had done a lot of work before JACKIE BROWN, but he did even more in the last twenty-two years of his career than he had in the first thirty. Over 100 of his 186 credits came after JACKIE BROWN. They include a remake of REAR WINDOW starring Christopher Reeve; Gus Van Sant's PSYCHO; the Jim Carrey comedy ME, MYSELF & IRENE; David Lynch's MULHOLLAND DRIVE; CHARLIE'S ANGELS: FULL THROTTLE; the short-lived Elmore Leonard TV series Karen Sisco; The Simpsons; Heroes; THE DESCENDANTS; OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN and LONDON HAS FALLEN; the Tim Allen series Last Man Standing; and the recent Twin Peaks revival, where he played Sheriff Frank Truman.

Quentin Tarantino has released a statement about Forster's passing, saying that 

…the world is left with one less gentleman. One less square shooter. One less good man. One less wonderful father. One less marvelous actor. I remember all the breakfasts we had at silver spoons. All the stories. All the kind words. All the support. Casting Robert Forster in Jackie Brown was one of the best choices I’ve ever made in my life. I will miss you dearly my old friend. Bye bye Max. Bye bye Miles. Bye bye Bob."

According to his IMDb page, we still have at least one more Forster performance to look forward to, as he's credited in an episode of the AppleTV+ revival of the Steven Spielberg series Amazing Stories. I just wish we had even more Forster characters to look forward to seeing for the first time. At least we have a whole lot of them to go back and see again.

Forster was one of the greats. He will be missed, and the work he did will continue to be enjoyed for a long time to come.

Our condolences go out to his family, friends, and fans.

R.I.P.