Sam Shepard

Sam Shepard was an actor and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, best known for his Oscar-nominated work as test pilot Chuck Yeager in The Right Stuff, the 1983 film about the original Mercury 7 astronauts.

Shepard won the Pulitzer in 1979 for his play Buried Child, about the fragmentation of a Midwestern family. He wrote more than 55 plays, including True West, Fool for Love, Chicago, Heartless and his final play, 2014’s A Particle of Dread.

His other film work as an actor included roles in Days of Heaven, Resurrection, Steel Magnolias, The Pelican Brief, Hamlet, All the Pretty Horses, Swordfish, Black Hawk Down, The Notebook, Brothers, Mud, Killing Them Softly and August: Osage County.

Shepard also appeared on television, most notably in an Emmy- and Golden Globe-nominated role as Dashiell Hammett in the 1999 telefilm Dash and Lilly. The biographical television movie, which was nominated for nine Emmys and three Golden Globes, chronicled the love affair of writers Hammett and Lillian Hellman, played by Judy Davis.

Additionally, Shepard appeared on the television series Great Performances and most recently, Netflix’s Bloodline. He also had roles in the miniseries Streets of Laredo and Klondike, as well as the telefilms The Good Old Boys and Lily Dale.

For television, Shepard wrote episodes of ITV Sunday Night Theatre, American Playhouse, and his play True West was adapted for a 2002 telefilm starring Bruce Willis.

He was also the author of several prose works, including Cruising Paradise and the memoir Motel Chronicles.

He was in a relationship with Jessica Lange from 1982 to 2009.

Shepard died July 27, 2017, in Midway, Kentucky. He was 73.