Louis Gossett Jr, first black man to win a best supporting actor Oscar – obituary

Louis Gossett Jr, who has died aged 87, was the first black man to win an Oscar for best-supporting actor after putting naval aviation cadet Richard Gere through his paces in An Officer and a Gentleman (1982); he was only the third black person to win any Oscar after Hattie McDaniel in Gone With the Wind (1939) and Sidney Poitier in Lilies of the Field (1963).

The role also brought him the first of two Golden Globes, the other being for The Josephine Baker Story (1991) in which he played an army officer who bonds with the eponymous singer and actress. Previously he received an Emmy award as the enslaved elderly musician Fiddler on an 18th-century plantation in the television series Roots (1977).

Standing 6ft 4in, prematurely balding and with an athletic figure, Gossett was the ideal drill sergeant in An Officer and a Gentleman, mercilessly knocking Gere and his fellow new recruits into shape with memorable lines as: “Stop eye-balling me, man!” Before playing the role he first underwent 30 days’ training of his own with the US Marine Corps.

Elsewhere he was a hot-headed activist with a penchant for indoor archery in The Landlord (1970); played the Bahamian drug dealer Cloche in The Deep (1977); was the only actor to appear in all four of Sidney Furie’s Iron Eagle films as Colonel Charles “Chappy” Sinclair leading a series of dangerous rescue missions; and received a worst supporting actor nomination in the Golden Raspberry Awards for Calvin the park manager in Jaws III (1983).

Gossett also had the unusual distinction of being the first man to give birth on screen when playing Jerry, from the self-fertilising Dracs species, in Wolfgang Petersen’s science-fiction drama Enemy Mine (1985), a box-office flop that later acquired a cult following.

Louis Cameron Gossett Jr was born in Coney Island, New York, on May 27 1936, the only child of Louis Gossett Sr, a porter, and his wife Hellen (née Wray), a maid. An uncle served in a US Army division that helped to liberate German concentration camps and Gossett later narrated a documentary about the soldiers’ experiences.

At school he excelled in sports until an injury forced his transfer into an acting class, which in turn landed him a role in the 1953 Broadway play Take a Giant Step. More stage appearances followed during his studies at New York University, though after service as a ranger in the US Army he dreamt of playing basketball professionally.

That was abandoned when he played George Murchison in Lorraine Hansberry’s play A Raisin in the Sun on Broadway with Poitier; later he reminisced about matinee-day poker games with Poitier and Paul Newman. He reprieved the role for Daniel Petrie’s 1961 film of the same name, for which Poitier and Claudia McNeil both received Bafta and Golden Globe nominations.

It was some years before Gossett returned to Hollywood, this time for The Bushbaby (1969) in which his character Tembo is suspected of kidnapping an English girl in Kenya. While driving in from the airport he was stopped six times “for DWB (driving while black)”, one of many experiences that led to him establishing the anti-racism foundation Eracism. His last major role was as Ol’ Mister Johnson in a musical remake of The Colour Purple (2023).

For the past two decades he suffered with ill health, compounded by many years of substance abuse. In 2010 he was diagnosed with prostate cancer and in 2020 he was admitted to hospital with Covid-19.

Gossett, whose memoir was aptly titled An Actor and a Gentleman (2010), married Hattie Glascoe in 1967, Christina Mangosing in 1973 and Cyndi James-Reese in 1987. All three marriages were dissolved and he is survived by two sons.

Louis Gossett Jr, born May 27 1936, died March 29 2024