Oscar and Tony-nominated character actor and folk singer Theodore Bikel, who played Captain von Trapp in "The Sound of Music" on Broadway and starred in "Fiddler on the Roof" onstage, has died. He was 91.
Bikel died of natural causes on Tuesday morning at UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles, publicist Harlan Boll announced, reported Variety.
Internationally renowned and respected as one of the most versatile actors of his generation, Bikel received an Academy Award nomination as best supporting actor for "The Defiant Ones" (1958), where he played a Southern sheriff.
The multilingual actor played a Dutch doctor in "The Little Kidnappers"; a Germany submarine officer in "The Enemy Below"; a French general in "The Pride and the Passion"; Russian military men in "Fraulein" and "The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming"; and a Hungarian phonetics expert in "My Fair Lady".
Other memorable feature credits include "The African Queen", "I Want to Live!", "See You in the Morning", "Crisis in the Kremlin" and "Shadow Conspiracy".
In "The Sound of Music," which opened on Broadway in 1959 and ran until 1963, Bikel earned a Tony Award nomination for his work.
On TV, Bikel made hundreds of appearances, co-starring as Henry Kissinger in the 1989 ABC miniseries "The Final Days" and guesting on shows as diverse as "The Twilight Zone," "Gunsmoke," "All in the Family," "Law & Order," "JAG," "Colombo" and "Star Trek: The Next Generation."
He had recurring roles on the primetime soaps "Dynasty" and "Falcon Crest."
Bikel did a weekly radio program, "At Home With Theodore Bikel," which was nationally syndicated. He is the author of "Folksongs and Footnotes," and his autobiography "Theo" was published in 1994.
Late into his life, Bikel wrote and starred in numerous performances of the play and musical "Sholom Aleichem: Laughter Through Tears," which had its world premiere in Washington in 2008.
More recent film credits include "Dark Tower" (1989), "Second Chances" (1998) and "Crime and Punishment" (2002).
