Oscar-Winner James Coburn Dies at 74  
 
By JOHN ROGERS, Associated Press Writer 

LOS ANGELES (AP) - James Coburn (news), the lean and lanky actor who 
rose to fame playing villainous roles in early action films and won an 
Academy Award decades later as an alcoholic father in "Affliction," has 
died of a heart attack. He was 74. 

Coburn and his wife, Paula, were listening to music at their Beverly 
Hills home on Monday when he suffered the heart attack, said Hillard 
Elkins, the actor's longtime friend and business manager. He was 
pronounced dead at Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. 

Coburn's breakthrough performances came in 1960s action flicks such as 
"The Magnificent Seven," "Hell is For Heroes" and
"The Great Escape." 

He then changed direction and found what was for decades his greatest 
fame: portraying tongue-in-cheek secret agent Derek Flint in the late 
1960s James Bond spoofs "Our Man Flint" and "In Like Flint." 

In 1998, he turned out what some would say was his finest screen 
performance, as the abusive, alcoholic father of Nick Nolte (news) in 
"Affliction." Coburn won a best supporting actor Oscar for that film. 

"He was a hell of an actor, he had a great sense of humor and those 
performances will be remembered for a very long time," said Elkins. 

Coburn had recently completed two films, the just-released "The Man From 
Elysian Fields" and "American Gun," which Elkins said should
be released 
soon. In the latter, Coburn's character travels the country in search of 
his daughter's killer. 

Born in Laurel, Neb., on Aug. 31, 1928, Coburn grew up Southern 
California, making his stage debut opposite Vincent Price in a La Jolla 
Playhouse production of "Billy Budd." 

Later, he moved to New York where he studied acting with Stella Adler 
and appeared in such classic 1950s television shows as "Studio One" and 
"General Electric Theatre." 

Returning to Los Angeles, he appeared regularly in such TV Westerns as 
"Wagon Train," "The Rifleman" and "Wanted: Dead or
Alive," throughout 
the 1950s. 

He made his movie debut in "Ride Lonesome" in 1959, following it with 
another Western, "Face of a Fugitive," that same year. 

But it was the following year that he really grabbed the public's 
attention, playing knife-throwing Britt in the epic Western "The 
Magnificent Seven." 

Although he had few lines compared with his other macho co-stars, who 
included Yul Brynner (news), Eli Wallach (news) and Steve McQueen, film 
historian Leonard Maltin noted Coburn's mere screen presence captivated 
his audiences. 

After "The Magnificent Seven," Coburn played sidekicks and villains 
until the late 1960s when he cashed in on the James Bond mania with the 
humorous "Flint" films. 

Other notable works included "The President's Analyst" (1967), 
"Goldengirl" (1979), and the Sam Peckinpah films "Major
Dundee" (1965) 
and "Pat Garrett (news) and Billy the Kid" (1973). 

In the 1980s he all but disappeared from the screen as he fought a 10-
year battle with a painful form of arthritis that left one hand 
crippled. 

He told The Associated Press in a 1999 interview that he had "healed 
himself" by taking sulfur-based pills. Although his knuckles remained 
gnarled, the pills cured him of the excruciating pain. 

His health restored, he worked steadily through the '90s, appearing in 
such wide-ranging fare as "Young Guns II," "The Nutty
Professor," "The 
Cherokee Kid" and "Maverick." He also provided the voice of corrupt 
company CEO Henry J. Waternoose III in last year's popular animated 
comedy "Monsters Inc." 

His role as Glen Whitehouse, the violent drunk in "Affliction" that 
Nolte's small-town cop feared becoming, brought him his only Oscar. 

"Some of them you do for money, some of them you do for love," he said 
of the film. "This is a love child," 

In addition to his wife, Coburn is survived by his son, James H. Coburn 
IV, and daughter, Lisa Coburn. 
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