The death has been announced of the Oscar-nominated American actor Frederic Forrest, best known for his performances in the films Apocalypse Now and The Rose. He was 86.
The entertainment trade publication the Hollywood Reporter says that Texas-born Forrest passed away at his home in Santa Monica, California on Friday after a long illness.
Following military service and college, Forrest's professional career began in Off-Broadway theatre in the late 1960s.
He made his film breakthrough in the 1973 Western Where the Legends Die, receiving a Golden Globe nomination for New Star of the Year.
Acclaimed as a character actor, Forrest first worked with director Francis Ford Coppola on his 1974 conspiracy thriller The Conversation.
He reunited with Coppola for 1979's iconic Apocalypse Now, playing Jay 'Chef' Hicks opposite Martin Sheen and Laurence Fishburne.
In the same year, Forrest starred opposite Bette Midler in the musical biopic The Rose, playing love interest Huston Dyer.
It was a performance that earned Forrest Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for Best Supporting Actor.
Paying tribute on Twitter, Midler described Forrest as "a remarkable actor, and a brilliant human being".
"I was lucky to have him in my life," she wrote.
Among Forrest's many other film credits were Arthur Penn's The Missouri Breaks, Coppola's One from the Heart and Tucker: The Man and His Dream, Wim Wenders' Hammett and Joel Schumacher's Falling Down.
On television, he had roles in the series 21 Jump Street and the Western miniseries Lonesome Dove, among others.
