Actor and Pulitzer-winning playwright Sam Shepard has died from complications related to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, his family revealed on Monday.
The actor grew up in the West and Midwest with a father he described as a violent alcoholic. After dropping out of college, he spent a few months with a traveling theater company and in 1963 at age 19 moved to New York with little money and no connections.
Most recently, he played patriarch Robert Rayburn in Netflix’s thriller Bloodline, his final on-screen role, and released a novel, The One Inside, in February.
The statement released stated that the funeral arrangements remained private, whereas no plans have been made yet for a public memorial.
