Actor Tony Todd, best known for starring in the horror film “Candyman,” has died at the age of 69.
The American actor reportedly died at his home in Los Angeles on Wednesday night.
He starred in the horror series, portraying a ghostly Candyman character with a hook for his hand who is summoned by speaking his name five times in front of a mirror.
Todd continued to play Candyman from the first film in 1992 through subsequent films in 1995 and 1999, reprising the role in the fourth film in 2021 as a direct sequel to the original.
Over the course of his 40-year career, Todd also appeared in hundreds of films, stage productions and television series, including roles in the Transformers and The Walking Dead films.
In “Candyman,” Todd’s titular character is the ghost of artist Daniel Robitaille, a black man who was lynched in the 19th century.
In the 1992 film, Todd’s character is accidentally summoned to the real world by a Chicago graduate student because of his interest in the urban legend of Candyman, triggering a series of murders.
talking The Guardian 2019Todd recalled the famous scene in the film in which Candyman is surrounded by bees, during which he was stung 23 times, apparently paying a $1,000 prize each time.
“Everything worth doing has to involve some kind of pain,” he said.
Of his Candyman character, he said in the same interview: “I’ve done 200 movies and this is a movie that stays in people’s minds. It affects people of all races. I did it as a gang intervention job Getting Started: What’s the scariest thing you’ve ever experienced?”
Actor Virginia Madsen, who played student Helen Lyle in Candyman, paid tribute, saying Todd “is an angel now. Just like he was in life.”
She called him a “truly poetic man” with a “deep knowledge of art.”
“I will miss him terribly and hope he haunts me occasionally,” she added. “But I won’t summon him in the mirror!”
The sequel to the original film, Candyman: Farewell to the Body, is set three years later, with Todd’s iconic protagonist reappearing in New Orleans and meeting the descendants of his daughter.
The third film, Candyman: Day of the Dead, was released in 1999 but is set in 2020 Los Angeles.
Todd and others from the 1992 film reprise their roles in the 2021 film.
2020, Todd Called the version “wonderful”praising the film’s director Nia DaCosta as a “fan of body horror.”
As part of the tribute, Madsen praised the “gift” the film’s co-writer Jordan Peele gave to him and Todd, “allowing us to live as lovers again.”
Prior to “Candyman,” one of Todd’s earliest film roles was as Sergeant Warren in the 1986 war drama “Platoon.”
