Broadway just lost one of its brightest stars. According to Variety and Deadline, veteran star Theodore Bikel passed away on Tuesday, July 21.
The longtime actor reportedly died in Los Angeles at the age of 91. Bikel spent much of his career on the Broadway stage and left a lasting legacy with his decades of work.
The Austria native opened the original 1959 production of The Sound of Music as Captain von Trapp, also appearing in Fiddler on the Roof, The Lark, and The Rope Dancers. Bikel's famed stage performances were sprinkled amongst a prolific filmography of television and film roles — one that began in the 1940s with small-time gigs.
Bikel got one of his biggest breaks in 1951, when he booked a role in The African Queen with Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn. He went on to earn an Academy Award nomination for his part in 1959's The Defiant Ones and appeared opposite Audrey Hepburn in 1964's My Fair Lady.
On the small screen, the multitalented star made a memorable appearance as Sergey Rozhenko in Star Trek: The Next Generation, also making cameos in All in the Family, Law & Order, and Murder, She Wrote. Bikel remained active in the years up until his death, telling the Los Angeles Times last June, "I never felt my age. I certainly don't feel 90 — maybe 70 — but not 90."
The late star, who has two children from his four marriages, is survived by his sons, two stepchildren, and his fourth wife, Aimee Ginsburg.
