Burt Reynolds, an icon of 1970s Hollywood, has died at the age of 82.
Reynolds’ manager, Erik Kritzer, confirmed the “Smokey and the Bandit” star’s death to The Hollywood Reporter, saying he passed away Thursday morning at Jupiter Medical Center in Florida.
The actor’s niece Nancy Lee Hess told Page Six on Thursday that her uncle “has had health issues,” but that his death was “totally unexpected.”
“It is with a broken heart that I said goodbye to my uncle today,” she said in a statement. “My uncle was not just a movie icon; he was a generous, passionate and sensitive man, who was dedicated to his family, friends, fans and acting students.”
She added of his “unexpected” passing, “He was tough. Anyone who breaks their tail bone on a river and finishes the movie is tough. And that’s who he was. My uncle was looking forward to working with Quentin Tarantino, and the amazing cast that was assembled [for “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.”]
A former college football player who took up acting after an injury cut short his playing career, Reynolds spent a decade taking on bit roles in Hollywood before breaking through with roles in some of the biggest films of the decade, including “Deliverance,” “The Longest Yard” and — the movie he’s best known for — “Smokey and the Bandit.”
Reynolds was born in Lansing, Michigan, on Feb. 11, 1936. His family settled in Riviera Beach, Florida, after his father, who served in the Army, returned from Europe in 1946. An All State football player in high school, Reynolds attended Florida State University on an athletic scholarship, playing halfback.
Although he intended to go pro, his career was cut short by a series of injuries. Reynolds briefly contemplated a career in law enforcement, but a teacher recognized his talent while reading Shakespeare in English class and pushed him toward acting. The move would be a fruitful one, earning him the Florida State Drama Award in 1956, which came with a scholarship to the Hyde Park Playhouse, a summer stock theater in Hyde Park, New York.
Afterward, Reynolds had a brief stopover in New York, where he appeared in several theatrical productions before moving out west to Hollywood. He began appearing on television in the late ’50s, but it wasn’t until 1962 that he secured a consistent role as the half-Native American blacksmith Quint Asper on “Gunsmoke.”
A decade later, he had his big-screen breakthrough in “Deliverance,” John Boorman’s psychological thriller about four friends whose rural rafting trip takes a terrifying turn. Reynolds said he considered the Oscar-nominated film, which co-starred Jon Voight, Ned Beatty and Ronny Cox, the best of his career.
The film helped establish Reynolds as one of the most marketable stars of the decade. He’d go on to star in a string of memorable hits including “White Lightning” (1973), “The Longest Yard” (1974), “Gator” (1976), “Semi-Tough” (1977) and, his most famous film, “Smokey and the Bandit” (1977). Reynolds starred in the film alongside future girlfriend Sally Field, playing Bo “Bandit” Darville, a charming outlaw tasked with transporting a tractor-trailer filled with beer over state lines.
Reynolds continued to act regularly over the next four decades, notably starring in the “Cannonball Run” franchise in the ’80s and the sitcom “Evening Shade” in the early ’90s. But the most famous role of the latter part of his career was in Paul Thomas Anderson’s 1997 film “Boogie Nights.” While the film about the golden age of porn earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor, it never stopped him from trashing the film, which he said he could never finish watching, or the director, whom he said he didn’t like. In May, it was announced that he had joined the cast of Quentin Tarantino’s upcoming film “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.”
An action star who did many of his own stunts, Reynolds was also a charismatic rogue and relentless flirt on-screen, helping to make him one of the biggest sex symbols of his time. So did his infamous appearance in the nude as a Cosmopolitan centerfold in April 1972. The actor was as much of a ladies’ man off-screen and was married twice, to Judy Carne from 1963 to 1965 and to Loni Anderson from 1988 to 1993. Despite those two trips down the aisle, the love of Reynolds’ life appeared to be his “Smokey and the Bandit” co-star Field, whom he famously described as the one who got away.
No matter the role, Reynolds always tended to play lovable rascals, something he knew audiences expected of him. “We’re only here for a little while, and you’ve got to have some fun, right?,” he told the New York Times in the spring of 2018. “I don’t take myself seriously, and I think the ones that do, there’s some sickness with people like that.”
Nancy Lee Hess, Reynolds’ niece, told us Thursday that “so many people have already contacted me, to tell me how they benefitted professionally and personally from my [uncle’s] kindness.”
“I want to thank all of his amazing fans who have always supported and cheered him on, through all of the hills and valleys of his life and career,” she said. “My family and I appreciate the outpouring of love for my uncle, and I ask that everyone please respect our family’s privacy at this very difficult time.”