Ron Thompson Found Dead At 83, Star Of ‘No Place To Be Somebody’ And ‘American Pop’

Ron Thompson, most known for his roles in Charles Gordone’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Broadway play No Place to Be Somebody and Ralph Bakshi’s animated cult classic American Pop, has died at 83. According to filmmaker Joe Black, a longtime collaborator with Thompson, Black would help out the actor a few times per week and found Thompson “in his Van Nuys apartment on Saturday afternoon.”

Recalling Thompson’s character, Black said, “For a man of his age, he was so full of life, he had such a presence…the Sam Jackson to my Tarantino.”

In 1969, Thompson started off-Broadway in Joseph Papp’s production of No Place to Be Somebody in the role of Shanty Mulligan starring alongside Ron O’Neal and then later accompanying the crew on Broadway and through a nationwide tour. After seeing No Place to Be Somebody originally, Robert Hooks, co-founder of the Negro Ensemble Company, said he felt compelled to meet Thompson backstage. Hooks took to Facebook to describe his thoughts on the late actor: “It might seem odd, but Ronnie Thompson is the only white actor I have ever known who deserves to be included in Black Theatre History…I have never known a white actor absolutely unafraid to go to the emotionally naked places that expose white jungle-fever delusion and turn it into heartbreaking pathos and high art.”

In American Pop, Thompson played the two main characters, the father and son duo Tony and Pete Belinsky. Speaking on the film in a 2012 interview, Thompson recalled the process of Rotoscoping on the film: “Live animators were still working. They would blow up the photograph, they would then trace the actor, his physical appearance, his movement, his expression, everything, then draw in the background…It’s not just the actor’s voice, you’re seeing the actor’s physical likeness and total performance, facial expression, everything!”

Thompson was born on Jan. 31, 1941, in Louisville, KY, later moving in 1945 to Miami. After watching Marlon Brando in On the Waterfront, he was inspired to become an actor and appeared as an extra in Jerry Lewis’ The Bellboy (1960). He then relocated to New York at 19 and, in 1962, starred in some episodes of CBS’ Armstrong Circle Theater.  Aside from acting, Thompson also recorded a few singles under rockabilly performer Ersel Hickey’s guidance. In 1973, Thompson received an L.A. Critics Circle Award for his role as Bickham in Does a Tiger Wear a Necktie?