Ed Asner Biography – Wiki
Ed Asner was a legendary actor who died. His family confirmed it on Twitter.
Ed Asner was an American actor and president of the Screen Actors Guild. He was known for playing Lou Grant during the 1970s and early 1980s, both on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and its spinoff series Lou Grant making him one of the few television actors to play the same. character in both a comedy and a drama. . He was the most honored male performer in Primetime Emmy Awards history, having won seven – five for playing Lou Grant (three as a supporting actor in a comedy television series on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and two as a leading actor in a dramatic television series about the spin-off Lou Grant). His other Emmy Awards were for performances in two television miniseries: Rich Man, Poor Man (1976), where he won the Best Leading Actor award for a solo performance in a television series, and Roots (1977), for which he won. for Best Individual Performance. by a supporting actor in a television series.
Age
Ed Asner has died at the age of 91-years-old.
Early Life
Eddie Asner was born on November 15, 1929, in Kansas City, Missouri, and grew up in Kansas City, Kansas. His Ashkenazi Jewish immigrant parents, Lizzie (née Seliger; 1885-1967, from Russia), a housewife, and Morris David Asner (1877-1957, from Lithuania (Vilna Governorate or Grodno Governorate)), owned a grocery store. second hand and a junkyard. He was raised in an Orthodox Jewish family and received the Hebrew name of Yitzhak.
Asner attended Wyandotte High School in Kansas City, Kansas, and the University of Chicago. He studied journalism in Chicago until a professor told him that he could earn little money from the profession. He quickly switched to drama, debuting as the martyr Thomas Becket in a campus production of T.S. “Murder in the Cathedral” by Eliot. He eventually dropped out of school, went to work as a taxi driver, worked the General Motors assembly line and other odd jobs before being drafted into the military in 1951. Asner served in the US Army Signal Corps. 1951 to 1953 and appeared in plays that toured army bases in Europe.
Married & Children
Asner was married to Nancy Sykes from 1959 to 1988. They had three children: twins Matthew and Liza, and Kate. In 1987, he had a son named Charles with Carol Jean Vogelman. Asner was the father and grandfather of a boy with autism and was involved with the non-profit 501 (c) (3) Autism Speaks. He also served as a board member and advisor to Aspiritech, a non-profit organization that trains high-performing autistic individuals to test software and provide quality assurance services to businesses.
Asner got engaged to producer Cindy Gilmore in 1991. They were married on August 2, 1998. She filed for legal separation on November 7, 2007. He filed for divorce in 2015.
Won A Lifetime Achievement Award
Asner was recognized at the Screen Actors Guild Awards in 2001, being named the 38th recipient of Life Achievement. He was a former union president, and at times controversial.
“I thank God that I am no longer young enough to know everything,” Asner said during his acceptance speech. “But one of the things I do know is that there are many countries in the world where the prize for life is just that: achieving life. I am very happy to have won the American Life Achievement Award, which to me means living with purpose and passion. ”
He continued: “I love acting, being an actor, and in my youth, I wandered from one play to another like in a dream. And wonder of wonders, I woke up and found out I was an actor. ”
Among his other accolades are five Golden Globes and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, which he won in 1992.
Activism
Asner proudly declared himself an “actor, author, activist” on Twitter, known for speaking out against social and political issues.
According to the Los Angeles Times, he spoke out against the participation of the United States in El Salvador, co-founder of Medical Aid for El Salvador. It was a controversial move for the president of the Screen Actors Guild, who blamed him for the cancellation of “Lou Grant.”
“I have an obligation to speak out for the cause of justice and protest against human misery and I will continue to do so,” the Los Angeles Times quoted the actor at a press conference, although he noted that neither CBS nor his sponsors pressured him to keep quiet. . .
The outlet referred to him as a “trade unionist” who joined the picket line during the actors’ strike in 1980. The publication also reported his support for the causes, “Amnesty International, American Civil Liberties Union, Death Penalty Focus, Defenders of Wildlife and Peace Now “.
Cause of Death
Asner died of natural causes at his home in the Tarzana neighborhood of Los Angeles on August 29, 2021, at the age of 91.
“We regret to say that our beloved patriarch passed away this morning in peace,” they posted on his account. “Words cannot express the sadness we feel. With a kiss on the head. Good night father. We love you. “The cause of death is currently unknown.
