Film icon Paul D’Amato, who notably played goon Tim ‘Dr Hook’ McCracken in 1977’s hockey comedy Slap Shot, has died. He was 76.
According to D’Amato’s fiancée, actress Marina Re, D’Amato died on Monday (Tuesday in Australia) at his Massachusetts home following a four-year battle with the rare neurological disorder progressive supranuclear palsy.
“He was the most wonderful, sweetest guy, he fought so hard against this horrendous disease,” Re told The Hollywood Reporter.
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D’Amato’s body of work didn’t only include his memorable turn as McCracken – he also stole the show in one scene in The Deer Hunter, which was named best picture at the Oscars in 1979.
He also starred alongside Cher and Dennis Quaid in Peter Yates’ Suspect (1978), playing a knife- and razor-wielding bad guy, as well as Heaven Can Wait (1978), F/X (1986) and Six Ways to Sunday (1997).
Film, however, was only one aspect of D’Amato’s multifaceted life.
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He grew up ice skating, served with the United States Army, and was a member of Boston’s Emerson College’s hockey team before he graduated in 1973, four years before his sports-heavy role in Slap Shot premiered.
D’Amato starred in a Cambridge Ensemble production of Deathwatch by Jean Genet, which moved to off-Broadway, before selling insurance like his father did.
That was before he attended the required hockey tryouts for Slap Shot in 1976, his big break.
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The first line he uttered in the film was, “Dunlop, you suck c–k”, which he later said he had been nervous about.
”I was very nervous and excited at the same time. The scene was pretty simple and straightforward, and I realised that being nervous was no excuse,” D’Amato said in 2007.
He told Bleacher Report: “So, like James Cagney would want, I planted my feet, looked him square in the eye and told him what I thought of him … It worked out pretty well, butterflies and all.”
D’Amato, who also started a couple of New York City theatre companies, worked in ski shops, and raised a significant chunk of change for charities through auctioning off an autographed No. 9 Syracuse Bulldogs hockey jumper, played a hockey player again in 1997 in CBS’ telemovie The Deadliest Season.
Survivors include his sister, Andrea, and Re, whom he met when they were in a play together in 2002.