Star who always ran hot
Rip Torn was a handful. The actor had a knack for stealing whatever scene he was in, most famously as the pit bull producer Artie on the TV comedy The Larry Sanders Show. But his crackling energy could be difficult to contain. While improvising a scene with Norman Mailer for the 1970 film Maidstone, Torn suddenly struck the novelist and director with a hammer. Unsure if Torn was acting, Mailer fought back, biting Torn’s ear in a scene that made it into the finished film. Torn’s temper arguably cost him the role of a lifetime, when he was replaced by Jack Nicholson in 1969’s Easy Rider after a vicious argument with director Dennis Hopper. (Both men claimed the other pulled a knife.) A producer “once told me that I didn’t work more often because of my temperament,” Torn said. “But that’s why I didn’t become a banker!”
Born Elmore Rual Torn in Temple, Texas, he was one of several men in his family—including his agronomist father—nicknamed “Rip” because of his last name, said The Guardian. He initially studied animal husbandry in college, then switched to drama “thinking that becoming a movie star was a good way to earn enough money to buy a ranch.” Torn hitchhiked to Hollywood in his early 20s, but after a few years of small parts relocated to New York City. There he caught the attention of director Elia Kazan, who cast him as an understudy in his Broadway production of Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, said the Associated Press. Torn eventually took over the lead role; “he was billed against his wishes as Elmore Torn.” Torn bloomed into “a versatile actor,” said The New York Times. He earned a Tony nomination in 1959 for a villainous turn in Williams’ Sweet Bird of Youth and a 1984 Oscar nomination for his backwoodsman in Cross Creek. Torn’s outsize presence proved perfect for comic parts. He won an Emmy for Larry Sanders and had memorable roles in 1997’s Men in Black and the sitcom
30 Rock. But his struggles with alcohol often overshadowed his talents. In 2010, police found him passed out with a gun inside a closed Connecticut bank, leading to a stint in rehab. Acting, he said, helped him through his troubles. “No matter how I felt, no matter what anyone said about me,” Torn explained, “I always had the audience.”