Federico Luppi

Argentine actor known for his parts in Guillermo del Toro films

Federico Luppi, an Argentine actor well known for his complex performances in the dark fantasy films of Guillermo del Toro, died on Friday in Buenos Aires. He was 83.

The cause was complications of a subdural hematoma, said his wife, actress Susana Hornos.

Luppi’s career, which began in the mid-1960s, included dozens of film and television roles, often in Argentine productions. Slim and stately with a shock of white hair, he endowed his characters with a sense of gravity.

One of those characters was Jesus Gris, the protagonist of the Mexican horror film Cronos (1993), del Toro’s directorial debut. Reviewing Cronos in The New York Times, Janet Maslin wrote that del Toro had “a considerable asset in Mr Luppi, who remains soigné and reason- ably calm no matter what happens to him, in a role that would also have been perfect for Vincent Price.”

Luppi appeared in two more of del Toro’s films, both set in Franco’s Spain. He was a leftist sympathiser who ran a haunted orphanage in The Devil’s Backbone (2001), and the monarch of a fairy kingdom in Pan’s Labyrinth (2006), which won three Academy Awards in 2007. Del Toro, writing in Spanish on Twitter, called him “Our Olivier, our Day Lewis, our genius, my dear friend.”

Federico José Luppi Malacalza was born on 23 February, 1934, to Alberto and Clementina Malacalza, poor Italian immigrants,inramallo,about 135 miles northwest of Buenos Aires. He studied architecture and worked in a slaughterhouse and a bank before he was able to support himself as an actor. He was blacklisted from Argentine productions for some years following open criticism of the government.

Despite this he remained a prolific actor, active in theatre, television and film. Other films included many by Argentinedirectoradolfoaristarain: Time for Revenge (1981); Common Ground (2002); A Place in the World (1992). His most recent film was Black Snow, a crime drama directed by Martinhodarareleasedthisspring.

He married Hornos in 2003. His survivors include two sons, a daughter and five grandchildren.