Donald Sutherland, a veteran actor known for roles in “M*A*S*H,” “Klute” and “The Hunger Games,” has died,
according to a statement from his agency CAA.
He was 88.
Sutherland died Thursday in Miami after a long illness, according to his agency.
“With a heavy heart, I tell you that my father, Donald Sutherland, has passed away,” Kiefer Sutherland, Donald Sutherland’s son, wrote in a post on Instagram Thursday. “I personally think one of the most important actors in the history of film. Never daunted by a role, good, bad or ugly.”
Kiefer Sutherland continued to write that his father “loved what he did and did what he loved, and one can never ask for
more than that. A life well lived.”
Decorated resume
Tall, distinctive and known for his intensity on screen, Sutherland earned an Emmy for his role as a Soviet official in the fact-based 1995 TV movie “Citizen X,” as well as a pair of Golden Globes. His career spanned more than 60 years and nearly 200 film and TV credits, including recent roles in the limited series “Trust” as oil tycoon J. Paul Getty and HBO’s “The Undoing.”
Sutherland’s big break came when he was cast as one of “The Dirty Dozen” in the star-studded 1967 film, which became a major hit. He followed that with another war movie, “Kelly’s Heroes,” before playing the wisecracking doctor Hawkeye Pierce in the movie version of “M*A*S*H” and opposite Jane Fonda in her Oscar-winning portrayal of a high-class “call girl” in the crime mystery “Klute.” (Fonda and Sutherland also had an off-screen relationship around the time that they made the film.)
Reflecting his ability to play all sorts of roles, Sutherland’s 1970s resume included a chillingly effective remake of the horror film “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” and a memorable turn as a pot-smoking professor in the National Lampoon comedy “Animal House.”