Lane Smith

Walter Lane Smith III was born on April 29, 1936, in Memphis, Tennessee, and died on June 13, 2005, in the Northridge neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. He is survived by his wife, Debbie Benedict Smith, and his son Robert Smith.

Smith received his early education at the Leelanau School, a boarding school in Glen Arbor, Michigan, and spent one year at the Hill School in Pottstown, Pennsylvania. He subsequently trained at the Actors Studio in the late 1950s and early 1960s alongside Dustin Hoffman and Al Pacino, and was later recognized in the Actors Studio Hall of Fame. Before beginning his professional career, Smith served two years in the U.S. Army.

His early professional work was concentrated in New York theater, and he made his film debut in Maidstone in 1970. Throughout the 1970s he accumulated small film roles, appearing in Rooster Cogburn in 1975 and Network in 1976. On stage during this period, he appeared on Broadway in The Leaf People. He also played McMurphy 650 times in the 1971 Off-Broadway revival of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. His television work in this era included a role as a United States Marine in Vietnam in the miniseries A Rumor of War and an appearance in the 1980 Hallmark Hall of Fame production Gideon's Trumpet, which starred Henry Fonda, José Ferrer, and John Houseman. In 1981, he appeared in Sidney Lumet's film Prince of the City.

The year 1984 marked a significant expansion of Smith's career. He appeared in the original Broadway production of David Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross, playing the role of James Lingk, a credit for which he received both a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Ensemble Work and recognition as a key member of that production's celebrated cast. That same year he appeared in the films Red Dawn, in which he played Mayor Bates, and Places in the Heart, and took on the recurring television role of collaborator entrepreneur Nathan Bates in the NBC series V.

In 1989, Smith portrayed President Richard Nixon in the docudrama The Final Days, a performance that earned him a Golden Globe Award nomination. He appeared in Air America in 1990 as a United States Senator, a role for which he was cast in part due to his physical resemblance to then-Minority Leader Bob Dole. In 1992, he played U.S. Congressman Dick Dodge opposite Eddie Murphy in The Distinguished Gentleman and district attorney Jim Trotter opposite Joe Pesci in My Cousin Vinny. That same year he appeared as Coach Jack Reilly in The Mighty Ducks. In 1993, Smith was cast as Perry White, the newspaper editor in the ABC series Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, a role he held for four seasons through 1997. In 1994, he appeared in The Scout alongside Albert Brooks and Brendan Fraser. His 1998 television work included a major role as fictional anchorman Emmett Seaborn in the HBO miniseries From the Earth to the Moon. His final film appearance came in The Legend of Bagger Vance in 2000, in which he played sportswriter Grantland Rice.

Smith was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis in April 2004 and died of complications from the disease on June 13, 2005, at the age of 69.