Martin Landau
American actor (1928–2017)
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Key Takeaways
- Martin James Landau ( ; June 20, 1928 – July 15, 2017) was an American actor.
- His career breakthrough came with leading roles in the television series Mission: Impossible (1966–1969) and Space: 1999 (1975–1977).
- He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor as well as the Screen Actors Guild Award and a Golden Globe Award for his portrayal of Bela Lugosi in Ed Wood (1994).
- He headed the Hollywood branch of the Actors Studio until his death in July 2017.
- His family was Jewish.
Martin James Landau (; June 20, 1928 – July 15, 2017) was an American actor. His career began in the late 1950s, with early film appearances including a supporting role in Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest (1959). His career breakthrough came with leading roles in the television series Mission: Impossible (1966–1969) and Space: 1999 (1975–1977).
Landau earned Academy Award nominations for his performances in Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988) and Woody Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989). He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor as well as the Screen Actors Guild Award and a Golden Globe Award for his portrayal of Bela Lugosi in Ed Wood (1994). Landau is also remembered for his performances in Cleopatra (1963), The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965), Rounders (1998), Sleepy Hollow (1999), and Remember (2015). He headed the Hollywood branch of the Actors Studio until his death in July 2017.
Early life and education
Landau was born on June 20, 1928, in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Morris and Selma Landau (née Buchman). His family was Jewish. His father was an Austrian-born machinist who tried to rescue relatives from the Nazis.
After attending both James Madison High School and Pratt Institute, he found work at the New York Daily News. There he spent the next five years as an editorial cartoonist and worked alongside Gus Edson to produce the comic strip The Gumps. He quit the Daily News when he was 22 to concentrate on theater acting. "I told the picture editor I was going into the theater," he recalled. "I think he thought I was going to be an usher."
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