Harry Dean Stanton

Harry Dean Stanton (July 14, 1926 – September 15, 2017) was an American actor, musician, and singer. In a career that spanned more than six decades, Stanton made notable appearances in the films Cool Hand Luke (1967), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Dillinger (1973), The Godfather Part II (1974), Alien (1979), Escape from New York (1981), Christine (1983), Repo Man (1984), Paris, Texas (1984), Pretty in Pink (1986), The Last Temptation of Christ (1988), Wild at Heart (1990), The Straight Story (1999), The Green Mile (1999), Alpha Dog (2006), Inland Empire (2006), and Lucky (2017), and had smaller roles in many others. 2Early life Stanton was born in West Irvine, Kentucky, to Ersel (née Moberly), a cook, and Sheridan Harry Stanton, a tobacco farmer and barber. His parents divorced when Stanton was in high school; both later remarried. Stanton had two younger brothers, Archie, and Ralph, and a younger half-brother, Stan. His family had a musical background. Stanton attended Lafayette High School and the University of Kentucky in Lexington where he performed at the Guignol Theatre under the direction of British theater director Wallace Briggs, and studied journalism and radio arts. "I could have been a writer," he told an interviewer for a 2011 documentary, Harry Dean Stanton: Crossing Mulholland, in which he sings and plays the harmonica. "I had to decide if I wanted to be a singer or an actor. I was always singin