Rip Torn

Rip Torn in 'A Stranger Is Watching'

Rip Torn (1931 - 2019)

Film Deaths:

• King of Kings (1961) [Judas Iscariot]: Commits suicide (off-screen) by hanging himself, his body is seen when Harry Guardino finds him.

• Slaughter (1972) [Dominic Hoffo]: Burned to death at the end of a car crash after insulting Jim Brown, the latter who later shoots Torn's car, starting a fire.

• Killer Joe (1974) [Richie] Drives off a cliff due to having a terminal ailment, and not wanting to die a slow death. 

• The Beastmaster (1982) [Maax]: Burned to death when he falls into a fire after being bitten on the neck by a ferret.

• A Stranger Is Watching (1982) [Artie Taggart]: Impaled through the neck with a metal rod by Kate Mulgrew in a subway tunnel.

• Cross Creek (1983) [Marsh Turner]: Shot in the chest by the sheriff in the woods, after Rip raises his shotgun (intending to hand it over).

• City Heat (1984) [Primo Pitt]: Shot to death in a shoot-out with Clint Eastwood and Burt Reynolds in a garage.

• Extreme Prejudice (1987) [Sheriff Hank Pearson]: Shot to death in an ambush while he's trying to help Nick Nolte.

• Hit List (1989) [Vic Luca]: Shot in the chest by Charles Napier.

• Canadian Bacon (1995) [General Dick Panzer]: Commits suicide (off-screen) after being disillusioned by learning that Hogan's Heroes was not a true story. (We learn of his death on an on-screen text reading at the end of the movie.)

• Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004) [Patches O'Houlihan]: Hit on the head by a falling sign in a casino. (Played for comic effect.)

• Eulogy (2004) [Edmund Collins]: Dies of old age/natural causes; his body is shown afterwards during his funeral, before being cast adrift in a boat which is then blown up when his grandsons (Curtis Garcia and Keith Garcia) shoot flaming arrows at it.

• Marie Antoinette (2006) [King Louis XV]: Dies of smallpox.

• Men in Black 3 (2012) [Zed/Large-Headed Alien at Zed's Funeral]: "Zed" dies of unspecified causes at some point between Men in Black II and this film. Rip makes an uncredited cameo in this film as a "Large-Headed Alien" who appears at Zed's funeral.

Television Deaths:

• Thriller: The Purple Room (1960) [Duncan Corey]: After believing that Rip had died of a heart attack when Richard Anderson scares him trying to drive him out of a "haunted house" that was on valuable real estate. Rip is shot dead by Patricia Barry when he staggers into her bedroom and she believes he's a ghost.

• The Man From U.N.C.L.E. Alexander The Greater Affair (1965) [Alexander]: Stabbed through the back of his pilot's seat with a crutch swordstick by David Opatoshu. (Thanks to Brian)

• Mannix: The Open Web (1972) [Victor Roarke]: Falls to his death from a helicopter.

• April Morning (1988; TV) [Solomon Chandler]: Shot in the stomach by a British soldier. He dies after talking to Tommy Lee Jones`s son (Chad Lowe).

• By Dawn's Early Light (1990) [E-4 Colonel Fargo]: Killed in a plane crash when they deliberately crash into Air Force One to stop Darren McGavin from launching a nuclear assault.

• 30 Rock: Future Husband (2010) [Don Geiss]: Although Rip doesn't appear in this episode, he dies (off-screen) several weeks before the events of this episode happen; his death is revealed when Jack Welsh tells Alec Baldwin and his funeral is depicted in the next episode, with his body in carbon freeze (a la Harrison Ford in Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back).

Notable Connections

• Ex-Mr. Ann Wedgeworth
• Mr. Geraldine Page (widowed) (long separated but never divorced)
• Mr. Amy Wright
• Cousin of Sissy Spacek