He began appearing on the Off-Broadway stage in 1961 with Shadow of Heroes, and followed it up with small roles in The Cherry Orchard, A Darker Flower and The Cat and the Canary. In the ‘00s, he provided the voice of Tessio to a series of "Godfather" video games. However, his previous successes continued to trail him. But he never regained his earlier momentum. Vigoda’s career slowed after the cancellation of "Fish." He took guest roles on other television programs, and the occasional film part-notably in the Tom Hanks comedy "Joe Versus the Volcano" in 1990. For three years running, he was nominated for an Emmy Award for his performance.Īfter three seasons, Fish was spun out into his own show, "Fish," in which he played the beleaguered patriarch to five wisecracking foster children. He quickly became the show’s breakout character. As the disheveled, grumbling, slow-moving, old-school Detective Phil Fish, he offered deadpan ripostes to his bewildering arrests, and weary resignation to his unseen wife Bernice’s many phone calls. Two years later, he was part of the cast of the sitcom "Barney Miller," set in the detectives' quarters in a gritty, but whimsical Greenwich Village police station. Vigoda's character memorably uttered the line, "Tell Michael it was only business. At the end of the film, he is caught in a betrayal of Michael Corleone, played by Al Pacino, and taken away to be killed. His first significant film role was in Francis Ford Coppola’s landmark 1972 Mafia saga, "The Godfather," in which he played Salvatore Tessio, a seemingly loyal capo in the Corleone crime family. Vigoda unexpectedly blossomed into a name actor and fan favorite in the early '70s. Most of the time, he played characters much older than he actually was-a circumstance that led to some macabre real-life comedy later on, when reports of his death were greatly-and frequently-exaggerated.Īfter a collection of Broadway and Off-Broadway stage roles in the 1960s, Mr. He perpetually looked like someone who had just received, or was expecting to receive, bad news, and used that quality to communicate both deep drama and droll comedy, depending on the assignment. In this, he was greatly aided by his long, mournful face and basset-hound eyes. Vigoda brought a distinctive and often endearing dejection and resignation to his roles on film and television.
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