R.I.P. Frederic Forrest, from Apocalypse Now and The Rose
Forrest, a regular collaborator with Francis Ford Coppola, also appeared in The Conversation, Valley Girl, and other memorable roles
Frederic Forrest has died. A prolific actor best known for his multiple collaborations with Francis Ford Coppola—most prominently in 1979's Apocalypse Now—the Oscar-nominated Forrest was a regular in both television and film. Per Variety, his death was first reported today by Bette Midler, who starred with him in 1979's The Rose. Forrest was 86.
Born in Texas in the 1930s, Forrest started out in the stage before making his way to film, starring in his first movie, Stuart Miller’s When The Legends Fall, in 1973. The next year, he scored the first of five roles he’d take on for Coppola, playing one half of a couple under intense surveillance and scrutiny in the paranoid thriller The Conversation. (A film he shares with Harrison Ford—who he’d later compete with for the role of Han Solo in Star Wars.) Forrest’s other Coppola roles included parts in One From The Heart, Hammett, Tucker: The Man And His Dream, and, most notably, Apocalypse Now, where he played squad cook Hicks, who has a memorable freak-out in the midst of the film’s war-torn chaos.