Tom Aldredge, Prolific Actor with Decades of Memorable Roles
In addition to years of theater and film credits, Aldredge gained recognition in recent years with roles on The Sopranos, Damages and Boardwalk Empire.
Tom Aldredge, who won a Daytime Emmy Award for his portrayal of William Shakespeare in a CBS special and more recently had prominent roles on the television dramas The Sopranos, Damages and Boardwalk Empire, died July 22, 2011, in Tampa, Florida.
According to news reports, the cause was lymphoma.
Although he worked extensively in film and television, Aldredge got his start in the theater and appeared in dozens of Broadway plays.
Among the more notable was the original production of On Golden Pond, in 1979, in which he originated the role of Norman Thayer Jr., a character played by Henry Fonda in the 1981 film version.
Born Thomas Ernest Aldredge on February 28, 1928, in Dayton, Ohio, studied acting at the Goodman School of Drama at DePaul University in Chicago.
He moved to New York to pursue theater work and made his Broadway debut in 1959 in the musical The Nervous Set. His other Broadway credits include a revival of The Little Foxes, and the Stephen Sondheim musicals Into the Woods and Passion.
He also performed with the Premise, an improvisational troupe that included Buck Henry and Gene Hackman, and with the New York Shakespeare Festival.
Over the course of his career Aldredge was nominated for five Tony Awards. He received a Drama Desk Award in 1972 for David Rabe’s Sticks and Bones.
In 1978 he won a Daytime Emmy for an episode of The CBS Festival of Lively Arts for Young People titled Henry Winkler Meets William Shakespeare.
On The Sopranos Aldredge played the father of Edie Falco’s Carmela Soprano; on Damages, he was a loyal fixer in the employ Glenn Close’s lawyer Patricia Hewes; and on Boardwalk Empire he was the father of Steve Buscemi’s Nucky Thompson.
His other television credits included The Adams Chronicles, Ryan’s Hope, Love, Sidney, Now and Again and Law & Order.
His feature film credits included The Mouse on the Moon, What About Bob?, Lawn Dogs, Cold Mountain, Intolerable Cruelty, All the King’s Men, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and My Sassy Girl.
Aldredge was married for 57 years to Oscar-winning costume designer Theoni V. Aldredge, who died in January 2011. According to new reports, there are no immediate survivors.