Louis Gossett Jr., First Black Man To Win Supporting Actor Oscar Has Died

Louis Cameron Gossett was born on May 27, 1936, in Brooklyn, New York, near Coney Island. He began acting in high school and was immediately taken with it. “I was hooked—and so was my audience,” he wrote in his 2010 memoir An Actor and a Gentleman. At his English teacher’s suggestion, Gossett tried his luck on Broadway and landed his first professional stage role at only 16 years old.

From there, Gossett made the leap to television, singing and acting on many of the popular variety shows of the ’50s, hosted by names like Ed Sullivan, Merv Griffin, and Jack Paar. In 1961, Gossett made his first trek out west to Hollywood to star in the movie version of A Raisin in the Sun. The experience would leave him disillusioned with Tinsel Town after the only motel he could find that would rent to black people ended up being a cockroach-infested dump.

Despite the shabby accommodations, Louis Gossett Jr. returned to Hollywood in 1968 to star in Companions in Nightmare, NBC’s first made-for-TV movie. This time he was booked in a much nicer hotel and even given a rented convertible to drive around LA in. Sadly within minutes of driving the car, Gossett was stopped by police and forced to open his trunk while they contacted the rental agency.

The experience would fuel Gossett’s lifelong crusade against racism. “Now I had come face-to-face with racism,” the actor wrote in his memoir, “and it was an ugly sight. But it was not going to destroy me.” Louis would go on to found the Eracism Foundation, a foundation dedicated to creating a world without racism.

Neal praised Louis for his civil rights work, remarking that his cousin walked with Nelson Mandela and worked hard to fight racism while simultaneously being a victim of it. As recently as the late 1990s, Louis Gossett Junior was still being pulled over simply for driving while being black—despite having already won international stardom.

A year later, in 1969, Louis Gossett Jr. would narrowly escape being involved in one of the most famous murders in American history. Gossett was invited to a party at actress Sharon Tate’s house on the fateful night when Charles Manson’s disciples broke into Tate’s house and murdered her and four other people. Louis took that as a sign that some higher power was looking out for him.

“There had to be a reason for my escaping this bullet,” he wrote.

Louis Gossett Jr. would have his big break on television with his role in the 1977 miniseries Roots. Gossett played Fiddler in Roots alongside other prominent black actors, John Amos., Ben Vereen, and Star Trek: The Next Generation‘s LeVar Burton. The series—one of the first to depict the horrors of slavery in primetime—led to an Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor for Gossett and opened the doors to other high-profile projects.

In 1983, Louis Gossett Jr. became the third black man to be nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar—and the first to win—for his role in An Officer and a Gentleman. The role won Gossett not only an Oscar but also a Golden Globe and made him a sought-after commodity in Hollywood.

The actor would follow up his role in Officer with roles in Jaws 3-D, Enemy Mine, Iron Eagle, and even a 1988 sequel to Roots titled Roots: The Gift. He continued to work up until his death, including a role in last year’s The Color Purple remake.

Gossett was married three times. His first marriage to Hattie Glascoe in 1967 lasted one year before being annulled. Gossett was later married to Christina Mangosing from 1973-1975 and Cyndi James-Reese from 1987-1992.

Louis Gosset Jr. is survived by sons Satie, a producer-director from Gossett’s second marriage, Sharron, a chef whom the actor adopted when he was seven, and first cousin actor Robert Gossett, best known for his role on The Closer.