JOHN MAHONEY, STEPPENWOLF ACTOR AND ‘FRASIER’ STAR, DEAD AT 77
Veteran actor John Mahoney, best known for his role as the curmudgeonly retired cop Martin Crane on the hit NBC series “Frasier,” has died, it was confirmed late Monday. He was 77.
The actor was also a critically acclaimed ensemble member of Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre, where he most recently starred in “The Rembrandt.”
A spokesperson for Steppenwolf said the theater canceled its opening night Monday for “You Got Older” out of respect forMr. Mahoney’s passing and encouraged opening night ticketholders to gather at the theaterMonday evening for remembrances and a moment of silence.
Though no official cause of death has been disclosed, Steppenwolf Theatre artistic director Anna D. Shapiro, who was a longtime friend of Mr. Mahoney, said he was in frail health in recent months.
“He was fragile and he was supposed to be having a routine procedure. But having just beat Stage 3 throat cancer, I think he was just too weak,” Shapiro said. “And John was incredibly private. He did not like complaining. He suffered a lot of what he suffered, in private. . . . By the time he did ‘ The Rembrandt,’ he was clean of cancer. . . . But other health issues came up and he was just too fragile.”
From 1993- 2004 on “Frasier,” Mr. Mahoney starred as Martin Crane, the down- to- earth father to elitist psychiatrists Frasier ( played by Kelsey Grammer) and his brother Niles ( played by David Hyde Pierce). He received an Emmy nomination twice for the role.
His film credits include “Say Anything,” “Moonstruck,” “Eight Men Out,” “In the Line of Fire,” “Reality Bites,” “Flipped” and “The House of Blue Leaves,” the latter based on the John Guare stage play for which Mr. Mahoney received a Tony Award. His TV credits aside from “Frasier” include “ER,” “Burn Notice” and “Hot in Cleveland.”
Mr. Mahoney was a veteran of many of Chicago’s stages, having appeared in more than 30 productions at Steppenwolf alone, including “Orphans” ( directed in 1985 by ensemble member Gary Sinisewho also costarred) and “You Can’t Take itWith You” ( directed by ensemble member Frank Galati and co- starring Sinise, Laurie Metcalf, Jeff Perrry and Rondi Reed), which Shapiro called his seminal performances.
“Hewas absolutely impossible not to love, absolutely impossible not to respect,” Shapiro said. “Everything he did [ on stage] felt true. And he did it with such grace. He was such a role model of humility and kindness. He was born to act. He was grateful to act, and he brought that to the experience. That affected the artists he worked with and the audiences who saw him.”
At Northlight Theatre, Mr. Mahoney starred in numerous productions including “A Life,” “What the Butler Saw,” Arthur Miller’s “The Price,” Christian O’Reilly’s “Chapatti,” and Bruce Graham’s “The Outgoing Tide.”
“Aside frombeing one of the greatest collaborators, he was a role model to all the young actors in Chicago because of his generous and warm and loving spirit,” said Northlight Theatre artistic director BJ Jones. Jones andMr. Mahoney collaborated on four productions presented by the Skokie- based theater company. Two of the shows, “Chapatti” and “Outgoing Tide,” were also presented at the prestigious Galway Theatre Festival, where “the shows were completely sold out,” Jones added.
“John loved Chicago, he loved Chicago theater and he really was of our community. When he had the opportunity to move to Los Angeles or New York he chose to stay here because he loved working here,” an emotional Jones said of his longtime friend and collaborator. “He was the essence of a Chicago theater creature. He defined it.”
Mr. Mahoney was a longtime resident of west suburban Oak Park, though he was born in Blackpool, England, in 1940. That’s where his pregnant mother had been evacuated for safety from Nazi attacks, but the family soon returned to its home inManchester.
In a 2015 interview with The Associated Press, Mr. Mahoney recounted memories of huddling in an air raid shelter and playing among bombed- out houses.
He moved to the U.S. as a teen to live with one of his sisters ( who had married a U.S. sailor) in Illinois. He studied at QuincyUniversity and later taught atWestern Illinois University. He began to pursue an acting career in earnest in the late 1970s.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel issued a statement Monday evening praising the late actor for his contribution to Chicago’s theater scene: “John Mahoney was a fixture on the Chicago stage for over 30 years through countless award- winning performances. Even as his fame grew through his fantastic work in movies and television, John stayed connected to his artistic home here in Chicago in theaters and as a member of the Steppenwolf Theatre Company. Though he will be missed, his work and impact will endure for generations to come.”
Shapiro said Mr. Mahoney asked her at a recent gathering to promise there would be no public memorial service in the event of his passing. She said the theater plans to abide by his request.
“The lake, the skyline, the museums, the symphony, the Lyric Opera,” Mr. Mahoney told The AP, in extolling the city in 2015. Add in reliably friendly Midwesterners, Mahoney said, and it’s “my favorite place in the world.”