Stacy Keach, celebrated as one of America’s premier stage actors and widely recognized for his portrayal of the rugged private investigator Mike Hammer on television, passed away on Tuesday at the age of 85. His career faced a significant setback after his incarceration in 1984 for attempting to smuggle cocaine into the UK.
According to a statement from his wife, Malgosia Tomassi Keach, he died at their home in Magdalenka, Poland, “following a prolonged and challenging struggle with a severe heart ailment and heart failure.” In June 2017, Keach experienced a heart attack while performing on stage in Chicago.
While he was renowned for his exceptional interpretations of Shakespeare and enjoyed the admiration of legendary directors such as John Huston, Keach will forever be associated with his role as the gritty detective Hammer, created by crime author Mickey Spillane.
Refusing to be typecast, Keach left behind a diverse array of characters, portraying a stoner cop in films, King Lear on stage, and serving as the narrator for World’s Most Amazing Videos on television. His impressive resume includes a performance as a disturbed colonel in The Ninth Configuration (also known as Twinkle, Twinkle Killer Kane), leading the series Titus, featuring in Alexander Payne’s Oscar-nominated film Nebraska, and recurring as an archbishop in the CBS drama Blue Bloods. Most recently, he received acclaim for his role as George Clooney’s resentful father in Jay Kelly.
“My goal was to have a wide range of roles to choose from. It may have negatively impacted my career,” he shared with New York magazine in 2012. “My decisions had consequences, but I’ve had the chance to play Hamlet, Richard III, and King Lear, and I wouldn’t trade that for anything.”
‘One of the greats’
Lou Diamond Phillips, who portrayed Keach’s son in the 2008 TV film Lone Rider, expressed his admiration on X, calling Keach a “masterful actor, generous, kind, and with the intensity of a smoldering volcano. One of the greats. I am proud to have shared scenes with him.”
Keach took on the role of French artist Julien Mistral in the CBS miniseries Mistral’s Daughter, played a Russian prince in the adaptation of Judith Krantz’s novel Princess Daisy, portrayed Barabbas in Franco Zeffirelli’s Jesus of Nazareth, and acted as Maj. Jonas Steele in The Blue and the Gray. His performance as Ernest Hemingway in a six-hour miniseries earned him a Golden Globe, during which he gained 35 pounds.
Keach, seen in April 1984, was one of America’s finest stage actors. (Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
He received a Tony Award nomination for his role as Buffalo Bill in the Broadway production Indians, acted as Edmund opposite Lee J. Cobb in King Lear on Broadway, and had additional stage roles in productions such as 1993’s The Kentucky Cycle, The Country Wife in 1965, and Other Desert Cities in 2011.
Keach also led the national touring company of Frost/Nixon, portraying the disgraced president, and toured with Sleuth, co-starring with Maxwell Caulfield. In 2006, he starred in a production of King Lear at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago and returned in 2017 for Pamplona, a one-man show centered on Hemingway, where he collapsed on stage, resulting in the show’s cancellation.
‘Lowest moment’ was prison
While still starring in Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer (later renamed The New Mike Hammer), Keach was apprehended in 1984 at London’s Heathrow Airport after attempting to bring in 1.3 ounces of cocaine hidden in an aerosol can of shaving cream and in other parts of his luggage. His secretary was also taken into custody.
Keach and his wife, Malgosia Tomassi Keach, pose for a photo at a premiere in 2006. (Lucas Jackson/The Associated Press)
“As the sentence was announced — nine months in prison — it felt as though someone had kicked me in the groin with heavy cleats,” he recounted in his 2013 memoir, All in All: An Actor’s Life On and Off the Stage. He remarked: “It was the lowest point of my life.”
He was handcuffed and taken to a cell the size of a closet, equipped with an orange plastic bucket for a toilet. Prior to his incarceration, an officer requested his autograph on a copy of the book The Blue and the Gray.
At 44 years old, he was placed in Reading Prison, a medium-security facility, as officials believed a minimum-security jail would allow reporters too much access. He was released after serving six months.
In his memoir, Keach shared that during his time in prison, he received supportive letters from Gregory Peck, Burt Reynolds, Roger Moore, and Al Pacino. He was assigned the task of screening a movie once a month and remembers selecting The Long Riders one time. He described the experience as “very lonely, very depressing, very sad. I spent much of my time reflecting on my own foolishness.”
Following his release, he narrated the documentary High on the Job and testified before Congress, revealing to a House panel how he became addicted to cocaine in the mid-1970s. “There is no greater imprisonment than dependence on a chemical substance for survival,” he stated.
Keach took his message to college campuses and rehabilitation centers. He also married Polish actress Malgosia Tomassi, whom he met during her appearance in the Hammer series. He cherished the letters and photos she sent while he was incarcerated.
Married 4 times
Having been married four times, Keach is survived by Malgosia and his daughters, Shannon and Karolina.
His first role post-release was in the CBS film Intimate Strangers alongside Teri Garr, becoming the third-highest rated TV movie of the 1985-86 season. His subsequent film, The Return of Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer, also performed well, leading to the Mike Hammer series being included in CBS’s 1986-87 schedule after being shelved since his arrest.
Years later, during the 2005-2007 television series Prison Break, Keach portrayed a prison warden and noted that he modeled his character after his real-life warden in England, whom he described as compassionate and committed to helping inmates rehabilitate.
Born in Savannah, Georgia, Keach was the offspring of actors who met at Northwestern University. He attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he obtained degrees in English and dramatic arts.
Stars such as Jamie Lee Curtis and Michael McKean, along with director John Carpenter, have paid their respects to Keach online.