NEW After hearing thousands of last words, this hospital chaplain has advice for the living
Hospital chaplain J.S. Park opens up about death, grief and hearing thousands of last words, and shares his advice for the living.
Clarence Gilyard Jr., the actor best known for playing computer hacker Theo in "Die Hard" and naval flight officer Marcus "Sundown" Williams in "Top Gun," has died at the age of 66.
His death was announced on Monday in a statement from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV), where he had been working as an associate professor at the College of Fine Arts.
"It is with profound sadness that I share this news," Dean Nancy Uscher said in the statement shared on Instagram. "His students were deeply inspired by him, as were all who knew him. He had many extraordinary talents and was extremely well-known in the university through his dedication to teaching and his professional accomplishments."
UNLV film chair Heather Addison remembered Gilyard as a "beacon of light and strength for everyone around him at UNLV."
She added: "Whenever we asked him how he was, he would cheerfully declare that he was 'Blessed!' But we are truly the ones who were blessed to be his colleagues and students for so many years. We love you and will miss you dearly, Professor G!"
No further details surrounding his death have been made public.
According to UNLV, Gilyard ventured into acting after studying Theatre Arts at California State University. He landed his first role on the TV show "Diff'rent Strokes" in 1981.
In 1986, Gilyard made his film debut in "Top Gun," in which he played Sundown, one of the elite fighter pilots.
Two years later, he was cast as Theo, the computer expert who helps Hans Gruber's terrorist group, in the thriller "Die Hard."
He got his big primetime TV break in 1989, when he landed the role of Conrad McMasters on the NBC legal drama "Matlock," starring opposite Andy Griffith. He then portrayed Chuck Norris' crime-fighting partner Jimmy Trivette on "Walker, Texas Ranger."
Gilyard's acting credits also include "The Karate Kid Part II," "CHiPS" and the "Left Behind" films.
Despite his accomplished acting career, Gilyard stepped away from acting in 2006 to start teaching at UNLV and directing productions at the university's Nevada Conservatory Theatre.
"I'm wired to teach. And I'm a professional, but the profession has to feed the classroom. It's what stimulates my characters because I'm in touch with people's lives in the 21st century," he told the Las Vegas Review-Journal in 2017.
"I work best as an artist when I'm in a fertile arena. That means creative and imaginative. Being with all those millennials — I don't understand what they're saying but I'm siphoning off their energy."
He did, however, make a brief return to the screen in 2021, when he reunited with Bruce Willis and De'voreaux White for a "Die Hard" battery commercial.
Hospital chaplain J.S. Park opens up about death, grief and hearing thousands of last words, and shares his advice for the living.
French police cordoned off the Iranian consulate in Paris on Friday, where a man was threatening to blow himself up, Europe 1 radio and BFM TV.
More money will land in the pockets of some Canadian families on Friday for the latest Canada Child Benefit installment.
An apparent Israeli drone attack on Iran saw troops fire air defences at a major air base and a nuclear site early Friday morning near the central city of Isfahan, an assault coming in retaliation for Tehran's unprecedented drone-and-missile assault on the country.
American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer, one of two men charged in the killings of a Canadian couple in Dominica, has been denied bail.
Canadian banks that refuse to identify the carbon rebate by name when doing direct deposits are forcing the government to change the law to make them do it, says Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault.
A woman who recently moved to Canada from India was searching for a job when she got caught in an online job scam and lost $15,000.
The World Health Organization and around 500 experts have agreed for the first time on what it means for a disease to spread through the air, in a bid to avoid the confusion early in the COVID-19 pandemic that some scientists have said cost lives.
Prince Harry, the son of King Charles III and fifth in line to the British throne, has formally confirmed he is now a U.S. resident.
At 6'8" and 350 pounds, there is nothing typical about UBC offensive lineman Giovanni Manu, who was born in Tonga and went to high school in Pitt Meadows.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.
Molly Knight, a grade four student in Nova Scotia, noticed her school library did not have many books on female athletes, so she started her own book drive in hopes of changing that.
Almost 7,000 bars of pure gold were stolen from Pearson International Airport exactly one year ago during an elaborate heist, but so far only a tiny fraction of that stolen loot has been found.
When Les Robertson was walking home from the gym in North Vancouver's Lower Lonsdale neighbourhood three weeks ago, he did a double take. Standing near a burrow it had dug in a vacant lot near East 1st Street and St. Georges Avenue was a yellow-bellied marmot.
A moulting seal who was relocated after drawing daily crowds of onlookers in Greater Victoria has made a surprise return, after what officials described as an 'astonishing' six-day journey.
Just steps from Parliament Hill is a barber shop that for the last 100 years has catered to everyone from prime ministers to tourists.
A high score on a Foo Fighters pinball machine has Edmonton player Dave Formenti on a high.
A compound used to treat sour gas that's been linked to fertility issues in cattle has been found throughout groundwater in the Prairies, according to a new study.