Original Shogun actor Richard Chamberlain dies at 90

Richard Chamberlain, the handsome leading man who charmed women on TV shows in the 1970s and 1980s, has died. He was 90. Chamberlain died Saturday night in Waimanalo, Hawaii, of complications following a stroke, his publicist Harlan Boll said. He was one day shy of his 91st birthday.

“Our beloved Richard is with the angels now,” Chamberlain’s longtime partner, Martin Rabbett, said in a statement. “He is free and soaring to those loved ones before us. How blessed were we to have known such an amazing and loving soul. Love never dies. And our love is under his wings lifting him to his next great adventure.”



Chamberlain began his career as a miniseries star by playing the role of fur trapper Alexander McKeag in James Michener's 16 1/2-hour, twelve-part saga Centennial, which aired on NBC in 1978-79, and he was the first actor to play Jason Bourne on screen when he played Robert Ludlum's character in The Bourne Identity, an ABC miniseries in 1988.

In his liberating 2003 autobiography Shattered Love, Chamberlain, then 69, came out as gay.

“When you grow up in the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s being gay, it not only ain’t easy, it’s just impossible,” he told The New York Times in 2014.

Chamberlain learned while growing up “that being gay was the worst thing you can possibly be. I assumed there was something terribly wrong with me. And even becoming famous and all that, it was still there.”



Chamberlain, a Beverly Hills native, was a relatively inexperienced actor when he was hired to play James Kildare, a serious intern with great manners — and the apprentice of Dr. Leonard Gillespie (Raymond Massey) — in Dr. Kildare (pictured).

The NBC drama was based on popular MGM radio and film series (Lew Ayres played the character on the big screen). Female viewers quickly fell in love with Chamberlain, and he received more than 12,000 fan letters a week. That was more than anyone else at MGM, not even Clark Gable.

The series aired for five seasons, from September 1961 to August 1966. "I pretended to be perfect, and that helped me play Dr. Kildaire, because he was almost perfect," he said.

In the Australian-set The Thorn Birds, which aired on ABC for four nights in March 1983, Chamberlain played Father Ralph, a Catholic priest embroiled in a tormented romance with the beautiful young Meggie (Rachel Ward), who seeks solace with a farmhand (Bryan Brown, her future husband in real life).

“It was one of the greatest love affairs in the history of the world, except that God was between them,” Chamberlain said.

The Thorn Birds, based on the novel by Colleen McCullough, was at the time the second highest-rated miniseries of all time, behind 1977's Roots (both produced by David L. Wolper). Chamberlain found its success somewhat surprising, as "it was one tragedy after another after another. Nobody came out on top."

James Clavell’s Shogun was originally intended to be a feature film starring Robert Redford. NBC acquired the rights after those plans fell through, and wanted Sean Connery to play the blustery Englishman John Blackthorne. When he was able to do it, the network cast Chamberlain, who had read the book and insisted on the role. He spent six months filming the miniseries in Japan, and the series aired for 12 hours over five nights in 1980.

Chamberlain’s last television role came in 2017, when he appeared in an episode of the third season of Twin Peaks.

On the big screen, Chamberlain played Julie Christie's brash husband in Richard Lester's Petulia (1968), the womanizing Aramis in a trio of Three Musketeers films, and the fortune-hunter Allan Quatermain opposite Sharon Stone in King Solomon's Mines (1985) and Allan Quatermain and the Lost City of Gold (1986).