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Oscar-winning 'Sound of Music' Star Christopher Plummer Dies at 91

Associated Press

   NEW YORK - Christopher Plummer, the dashing, award-winning actor who
   played Captain von Trapp in the film The Sound of Musicand at 82 became
   the oldest Academy Award acting winner in history, has died. He was 91.

   Plummer died Friday morning at his home in Connecticut with his wife,
   Elaine Taylor, by his side, said Lou Pitt, his longtime friend and
   manager.

   Across more than 50 years in the industry, Plummer enjoyed varied
   roles. He was a sophisticated businessman in the film The Girl With the
   Dragon Tattoo,the voice of the villain in 2009's Upand a canny lawyer
   in Broadway's Inherit the Wind.In 2019, he starred as a murdered
   mystery novelist in Rian Johnson's whodunnit Knives Out.

   But it was his role as von Trapp, opposite Julie Andrews, 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."

   'Cardboard figure'

   "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."

   The role catapulted Plummer to stardom, but he never took to
   leading-man parts, despite his silver hair, good looks and 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."

   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 Insiderand continued in films such as 2001's A Beautiful
   Mindand 2009's The Last Station,in which he played a deteriorating
   Tolstoy and was nominated for an Oscar.

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