Nine to Five star Dabney Coleman

US actor Dabney Coleman, a Hollywood veteran of TV and film who specialised in playing villains, including in the classic Nine To Five, has died at the age of 92.

Born in 1932, in Austin, Texas, Coleman served in the army in the 1950s ahead of studying acting in New York.

Coleman made his debut on Broadway in A Call On Kuprin in 1961 and made his first TV appearance on an episode of Naked City the same year.

He was prolific and, in spite of his good looks, soon became known for character roles, developing into the bad guy audiences loved to hate.

Coleman appeared on more than 100 episodes of two quirky night-time soap parodies, the cultural phenomenon Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman (1976-1977) and its spin-off Forever Fernwood (19771978), as Merle Jeeter.

In films from 1965, he appeared in eclectic fare, from the Elvis movie The Trouble with Girls and Downhill Racer (both 1969) to the disaster epic The Towering Inferno (1974).

Twenty years into his career, Coleman landed the part with which he would always be most associated, that of “sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot” boss man Franklin Hart Jr. in Nine To Five (1980).

The comedy starred Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin and Dolly Parton as frustrated office workers who hatch a plot to restrain Hart while taking over their end of the heartless corporation for which they have toiled thanklessly.

It also helped Coleman land a rare lead, anchoring the sitcom Buffalo Bill (1983-1984). The series, about an ego-tripping talk show host, featured Geena Davis and Joanna Cassidy. Coleman received his first Emmy nomination for his performance.

He went on to appear in a string of movie hits, among them On Golden Pond (1981), Tootsie (1982), War Games (1983), The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984) and You’ve Got Mail (1998).

Other noteworthy films included Modern Problems (1981), Young Doctors in Love (1982), Cloak & Dagger (1984), The Man with One Red Shoe (1985), Dragnet (1987), The Beverly Hillbillies (1993), Clifford (1994), Inspector Gadget (1999), Stuart Little (1999), Moonlight Mile (2002), and Warren Beatty’s last directorial effort, Rules Don’t Apply (2016), which marked Coleman’s final film.

In the latter part of his career, Coleman was the voice of Principal Prickly on the animated series Recess (1997-2001) and gave memorable performances on The Guardian (2001-2004), “Boardwalk Empire” (20102011), and, in his final onscreen appearance, Yellowstone (2019), on which he played the father of series star Kevin Costner’s character.

He was nominated for the Emmy six times — including three times in one year — winning Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie for Sworn to Silence”(1987). He won a Golden Globe for Best Actor — Television Series Musical or Comedy for The Slap Maxwell Story (1988).

Married and divorced twice, including to late actress Jean Hale, he is survived by his four children.

Dabney Coleman.