The Directors Guild of America has commiserated with the family, friends and fans of late American actor, Martin Landau, who died on Saturday at UCLA Medical Centre in Los Angeles following “unexpected complications during a short hospitalization.
The American actor, who starred in the 1960s television show “Mission Impossible” and won an Oscar for playing Bela Lugosi in the movie “Ed Wood,” is dead at 89.
The Guild, in a statement jointly signed by the President and General Secretary, described the death of the veteran actor as a huge loss to the entire creative industry.
The statement in part: ” We commiserate with the family, friends and associates of our late veteran actor, Martin Landau at this critical time. His death is a huge loss to the entire creative industry and we in the Directors’ Guild share the pain families and fans are going through.”
Landau was born on June 28, 1928, in Brooklyn and worked as a cartoonist for the New York Daily News before becoming an actor.
In 1957, he had a part in the play, “Middle of the Night,” with Edward G. Robinson and ended up on the West Coast, according to the Internet Movie Data base.
“Mission Impossible,” Landau’s iconic film, which also starred his wife, Barbara Bain, became an immediate hit upon its debut in 1966. It remained on the air until 1973, but Landau and Bain left at the end of the show’s third season amid financial dispute with the producers. The actor and his wife also starred in the British-made sci-fi series “Space: 1999” from 1975 to 1977.
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