Actor Eli Wallach dies at 98
Hollywood star and early practitioner of 'method' acting enjoyed a career spanning six decades
Eli Wallach, an early practitioner of method acting who made a lasting impression as the scuzzy bandit Tuco in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, has died. He was 98.
Wallach's career as an actor spanned six decades.
He made his Broadway debut in 1945 and in his 90s was still acting in movies, including The Holiday (2006) and The Ghost Writer (2010).
"It's what I wanted to do all my life," Wallach said of his work in 2010, the year in which he received an honorary Academy Award for lifetime achievement as an actor.
Having grown up the son of Polish Jewish immigrants in an Italian-dominated neighbourhood in New York, Wallach might have seemed an unlikely cowboy, but some of his best work was in westerns.
Many critics thought his definitive role was Calvera, the flamboyant, sinister bandit chief in The Magnificent Seven. Others preferred him in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly as Tuco, who was "the ugly", opposite Clint Eastwood and Lee Van Cleef in Sergio Leone's classic spaghetti western.