Gisteren is bekend geworden dat cult acteur Michael Parks is overleden op 77 jarige leeftijd. Nu zal zijn naam voor veel mensen niet bekend klinken maar deze man speelde in een shitload aan grote legendarische films en TV series, en was recent in Kevin Smith's Red State en Tusk (recensie) als een behoorlijke creepy mofo te zien. Door zijn status als serieuze acteur was hij veel gevraagd door cult regisseurs als de eerder genoemde Kevin Smith, Quentin Tarantino, David Lynch en Robert Rodriguez.

Michael Parks, the brooding actor who broke through as television's first easy rider on Then Came Bronson and resurrected by David Lynch, Quentin Tarantino, and Robert Rodriguez as an icon of Hollywood cool, died yesterday. He was 77.

His death was confirmed by his talent agent Jane Schulman, who did not disclose a cause.

Parks worked steadily if without major note through the '70s and '80s, appearing on The Colbys, The Equalizer and The Return of Josey Wales, also directing the latter, a 1986 feature film sequel to the Clint Eastwood film The Outlaw Josey Wales.

The actor's career was revitalized with Twin Peaks, the David Lynch sensation in which Parks played the murderous French-Canadian drug-runner Jean Renault. After that, he appeared mostly in feature films, a favorite of the hot '90s directors who no doubt recalled Bronson. Over the next decades Parker would appear in Tarantino's From Dusk till Dawn and Kill Bill films, Django Unchained, the Tarantino/Rodriguez Grindhouse, Kevin Smith's Red State and Tusk, and Andrew Dominik's The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, among others.

According to Schulman, Parks was a close friend of both Jean Renoir and Johnny Cash, was a pall bearer for Lenny Bruce. His brief teenage marriage to Louise Johnson produced a daughter, and in 1997 Parks married Oriana Parks who, along with son James, survives him. Funeral services are pending.