Christopher Plummer, acclaimed ‘Sound of Music’ star, dead at 91
By: Mark Kennedy
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Christopher Plummer, acclaimed ‘Sound of Music’ star, dead at 91
Angela Cartwright (left), Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer and Charmian Carr belt out a tune in the 1965 classic “The Sound of Music.”Photo: Castro Theatre, Castro Theatre
Plummer died Friday, Feb. 5, at his home in Connecticut with his wife, Elaine Taylor, by his side, said Lou Pitt, his longtime friend and manager.
Over more than 50 years in the industry, Plummer enjoyed varied roles such as a wealthy businessman in the film “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,” the voice of the villain in 2009’s “Up” and a canny lawyer in Broadway’s “Inherit the Wind.” In 2019 he starred as a murdered mystery novelist in Rian Johnson’s whodunit “Knives Out.”
But it was performing opposite Julie Andrews as von Trapp that made him a star. He played an Austrian captain who must flee the country with his folk-singing family to escape service in the Nazi navy, a role he lamented was “humorless and one-dimensional.” Plummer spent the rest of his life referring to the film as “The Sound of Mucus” or “S&M.”
“We tried so hard to put humor into it,” he told the Associated Press in 2007. “It was almost impossible. It was just agony to try to make that guy not a cardboard figure.”
Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer star in the Oscar-winning musical “The Sound of Music.”Photo: 20th Century Fox
The role catapulted Plummer to stardom, but he never took to leading man parts, despite his silver hair, good looks and ever-so-slight English accent. He preferred character parts, considering them more meaty.
Tributes quickly came from Hollywood and Broadway. Joseph Gordon-Levitt called him “one of the greats” and George Takei posted “Rest in eternal music, Captain von Trapp.” Dave Foley, a fellow Canadian, wrote: “If I live to be 91 maybe I’ll have time to fully appreciate all the great work of Christopher Plummer.”
Christopher Plummer… one of the greats. <3 pic.twitter.com/Nv0ANVQeWf
— Joseph Gordon-Levitt (@hitRECordJoe) February 5, 2021
This is truly heartbreaking. What an unbelievable loss. Few careers have such longevity and impact. One of my favorite memories from Knives Out was playing piano together in the Thrombey house between set ups. He was a lovely man and a legendary talent. https://t.co/eFwNVe762w
— Chris Evans (@ChrisEvans) February 5, 2021
Plummer had a remarkable film renaissance late in life, which began with his acclaimed performance as Mike Wallace in Michael Mann’s 1999 film “The Insider” and continued in films such as 2001’s “A Beautiful Mind” and 2009’s “The Last Station,” in which he played a deteriorating Tolstoy and was nominated for an Oscar.
In 2012, Plummer won a supporting actor Oscar for his role in “Beginners” as Hal Fields, a museum director who becomes openly gay after his wife of 44 years dies. His loving, final relationship becomes an inspiration for his son, who struggles with his father’s death and how to find intimacy in a new relationship.
“Too many people in the world are unhappy with their lot. And then they retire and they become vegetables. I think retirement in any profession is death, so I’m determined to keep crackin’,” he told the Associated Press in 2011.
Plummer in 2017 replaced Kevin Spacey as J. Paul Getty in “All the Money in the World” just six weeks before the film was set to hit theaters. “Plummer delivers brilliance in what had to be record time,” Chronicle film critic Mick LaSalle said in his review of the film, and indeed the choice to replace Spacey with Plummer was officially validated in the best possible way for the film — a supporting Oscar nomination for Plummer, his third.
Christopher Plummer as J. Paul Getty in “All the Money in the World.”Photo: Giles Keyte , Sony
In 2019, he starred in the TV suspense drama series “Departure.”
There were fallow periods in his career — a “Pink Panther” movie here, a “Dracula 2000” there and even a “Star Trek” — as a Klingon, no less. But Plummer had other reasons than the scripts in mind.
“For a long time, I accepted parts that took me to attractive places in the world. Rather than shooting in the Bronx, I would rather go to the south of France, crazed creature than I am,” he told the AP in 2007. “And so I sacrificed a lot of my career for nicer hotels and more attractive beaches.”
The Canadian-born actor performed most of the major Shakespeare roles, including Hamlet, Cyrano, Iago, Othello, Prospero, Henry V and a staggering “King Lear” at Lincoln Center in 2004. He was a frequent star at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival in Canada.
“I’ve become simpler and simpler with playing Shakespeare,” he said in 2007. “I’m not as extravagant as I used to be. I don’t listen to my voice so much anymore. All the pitfalls of playing the classics — you can fall in love with yourself.”
Canadian-born actor Christopher Plummer, shown June 15, 1973, poses for a photo before making his musical debut on Broadway in “Cyrano.”Photo: Jerry Mosey, Associated Press 1973
He won two Tony Awards. The first was in 1974 for best actor in a musical for playing the title role in “Cyrano” and his second in 1997 for his portrayal of John Barrymore in “Barrymore,” which he brought to San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre the following year, earning praise from The Chronicle’s Steven Winn.
“In his glittering gaze, Plummer catches a life at the vanishing point, stripping away sentiment and resisting false epiphanies,” Winn wrote. “Plummer doesn’t want to make Jack Barrymore add up or see the light. He trains his formidable technique on the mystery and muddle of a man who’s run out the string.”
Plummer also won two Emmys.
Christopher Plummer accepts the award for best actor in a supporting role for his work in the movie “Beginners” at the 84th Academy Awards in Los Angeles on Feb. 26, 2012.Photo: Monica Almeida, New York Times 2012
Plummer was born Arthur Christopher Orme Plummer in Toronto. His maternal great-grandfather was former Canadian Prime Minister Sir John Abbott. His parents divorced shortly after his birth and he was raised by his mother and aunts.
Plummer began his career onstage and in radio in Canada in the 1940s and made his Broadway debut in 1954 in “The Starcross Story.” While still a relative unknown, he was cast as Hamlet in a 1963 performance co-starring Robert Shaw and Michael Caine. It was taped by the BBC at Elsinore Castle in Denmark, where the play is set, and released in 1964. It won an Emmy.
Plummer married Tony-winning actress Tammy Grimes in 1956, and fathered his only child, actress Amanda Plummer, in 1957. Like both her parents, she also won a Tony, in 1982 for “Agnes of God.” (Grimes won two Tonys, for “Private Lives” and “The Unsinkable Molly Brown.”)
Plummer and Grimes divorced in 1960. A five-year marriage to Patricia Lewis ended in 1967. Plummer married his third wife, dancer Taylor, in 1970, and credited her with helping him overcome a drinking problem.
He was given Canada’s highest civilian honor when he was invested as a Companion of the Order of Canada by Queen Elizabeth II in 1968, and he was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 1986.
Chronicle theater critic Lily Janiak contributed to this story.
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I first saw Plummer act in a live Shakespeare play in the late 1950s at the Stratford, Ontario, Shakespeare Festival, and thought he was amazingly like Sir Laurence Olivier. He acted in many movies that are not mentioned in the article, one of which I happened to own 1% of - 'The Silent Partner' that starred him, Elliott Gould and Suzannah York. It was a $26.000 tax shelter investment and I never got a dime from it but it did serve its tax purpose.
Some great Canadians are too soon gone - Alex Trebek, and now Christopher Plummer.
A man for all seasons or roles. A true professional, RIP Christopher.
He had a long career and was like fine wine that got better with age.