James Caan, actor of 'The Godfather' and 'Misery', dies at 82
Actor James Caan, popular for having given life to Sonny Corleone in The Godfather, He has died at the age of 82, as confirmed by his family on the actor's official Twitter account. “It is with great sadness that we inform you of Jimmy's passing on the night of July 6th. The family appreciates the outpouring of love and sincere condolences and asks that you respect their privacy during this difficult time," the statement said.
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Caan also went down in film history for another emblematic character, that of Paul Sheldon in the film adaptation he made Rob Reiner from Stephen King's book, Misery. The scene in which Kathy Bates broke his ankles with a hammer is one of the most terrifying in cinema in recent decades and an icon imitated and later referenced. Despite his fame, Caan was only nominated for an Academy Award for his role in Francis Ford Coppola's 1973 film.
Coppola became his film godfather, since before giving him the role of Sonny he had already trusted him in It Rains on My Heart, in 1969, although Caan had already worked a lot on television. It was the director of Apocalypse Now who also rescued him at his worst. After the death of his sister from leukemia in 1982, James Caan suffered from severe depression that led to a serious addiction to cocaine and not to appear in any film between 1982 and 1987.
It was Coppola who convinced him to return to Stone Gardens in 1987. His return came with several of his best roles, including Dick Tracy and Misery. In 1992 he co-starred in another of his biggest hits, Honeymoon alongside Sarah Jessica Parker and Nicolas Cage.
In his filmography there are many other titles to remember. He was the protagonist of Rollerball (1975), a dystopian science fiction directed by Norman Jewison that became a cult phenomenon and even had a remake in 2002. Another was Thief (1981), directed by Michael Mann, director of Heat , and the role he was most proud of after that of Sonny Corleone in The Godfather.
In 2003 he received two other roles that marked his career. He appears in the personal and authorial Dogville, under the orders of Lars Von Trier, and begins his career in the series Las Vegas, in which he plays one of the protagonists for five seasons. There he would play a former CIA agent who becomes president of operations at the Montecito, a casino for which he runs the day-to-day operations.
