James Earl Jones, renowned actor and voice of Darth Vader, dies at 93
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American actor James Earl Jones, an imposing stage and screen presence who overcame a childhood stutter to develop a stentorian voice recognized the world over as intergalactic villain Darth Vader, died on Monday at the age of 93.
Jones, a longtime sufferer of diabetes, died at his home surrounded by family members, his agent, Barry McPherson, said.
No cause of death was provided.
James Earl Jones was born on January 17, 1931, in the tiny community of Arkabutla, Mississippi, to a family with a mixed ethnic background of Irish, African and Cherokee.
* “Star Wars” creator George Lucas wanted a commanding voice for Darth Vader and first considered casting Orson Welles. He eventually decided that Welles was too recognizable and went with Jones.
* One of moviedom’s most famous dialogues comes in “Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back” when Luke Skywalker learns the truth about his family tree. The key line in the 1980 film is usually quoted as evil Darth Vader telling the Jedi, “Luke, I am your father.”
The exchange actually goes like this:
Darth Vader: Obi-Wan never told you what happened to your father.
Luke Skywalker: He told me enough! He told me you killed him!
Darth Vader: No. I am your father.
* Jones’ own father, Robert Earl Jones, also was an actor, starting in the 1939 movie “Lying Lips.” He would later appear in “The Cotton Club” and “Witness” in the 1970s and 1980s. His best-known role was in “The Sting,” the 1973 film starring Robert Redford and Paul Newman, in which he played Luther Coleman, Redford’s grifting partner. When Luther is killed by a gangster, Redford and Newman seek revenge by putting together the grand con that is the movie’s centerpiece.
* Other than a 7-year-old Sammy Davis Jr. in the 1933 musical short “Rufus Jones for President,” James Earl Jones is considered the first Black person to portray a U.S. president in a movie. “The Man,” a 1972 adaptation of an Irving Wallace novel, starred Jones as Douglass Dilman, the president pro tempore of the Senate who ascends after the president and House speaker are killed and the vice president declines the office.
* In 1971 Jones began using his magnificent voice for primal therapy, which calls for reliving repressed childhood traumas as a way to releasing them, often through screaming. Jones built a soundproof chamber in his home to work out his problems. “I am quoted as saying that primal therapy cured me of a cigarette habit, sinus trouble and a compulsive sexual urge and, last but not least, cured my hemorrhoids,” Jones wrote in his 1993 autobiography, “Voices and Silences.” “That seems like hyperbole now.”
