The highly respected actor and Academy Award-winning director of the epic biopic “Gandhi” Lord Richard Attenborough is dead at the age of 90.  No cause of death was released, but it’s known he had been in poor health ever since a fall in 2008.

One of the first movies to put him on the map was the 1947 film noir “Brighton Rock”, in which he portrayed the psychopathic teen hoodlum “Pinkie”, a role he played to great acclaim in the theater a few years earlier.  He worked steadily in British films in the coming years, all the while developing a little frustration over interpreting other peoples’ visions rather than advancing his own.

In 1963, Attenborough broke through in Hollywood in the role of RAF Squadron Leader Roger Bartlett in 1963’s “The Great Escape”.  In 1967 and 1968, he won Golden Globes for Best Supporting Actor for “The Sand Pebbles” and “Doctor Doolittle”. 

But it was something that happened in 1962 that would lead to his greatest acclaim.  In that year, Attenborough read the biography of India’s non-violent political and spiritual leader Mohandas K. Gandhi.  For 183, Attenborough, cast, and crew told of Gandiji’s life from his struggles against institutional racism in South Africa to gaining India’s independence from England through a long series of campaigns of organized non-violent disobedience.

“Every career decision I’ve made since then has been tempered by my love affair with this one project,” Attenborough said in 1981 of his two-decade journey to bring the enormous project to life.  “I’ve given up 40 acting roles and a dozen directing assignments to pursue it.”

1982’s “Gandhi” message of righteous struggle, antiracism, and social justice defied the excesses of Cold War bravado as practiced by then-US and UK leaders Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher.  It won eight Academy Awards – the most of any British motion picture until that time – including one each Best Director and Best Producer for Richard Attenborough, and Best Actor for its heretofore largely-unknown leading man Ben Kingsley.

“When he gave me the part of Gandhi it was with great grace and joy.  He placed in me an absolute trust and in turn I placed an absolute trust in him and grew to love him,” said Sir Ben Kingsley today, adding that he would “miss him dearly”.

He later directed the film adaptation of the Broadway music “A Chorus Line” (1985); returned to the themes of social justice in exposing South African Apartheid’s crimes in “Cry Freedom” (1987); reintroduced the world to the “little tramp” who got people to think in “Chaplin” (1992).

Modern movie audiences likely know Richard Attenborough best for his return to acting as the grandfatherly billionaire intent whose misguided science turns into a dinosaur disaster in “Jurassic Park” (1993).

Over the decades, Attenborough was deeply involved with raising money for charity and social justice.  He was also a life-president of Chelsea Football Club.

“His personality was woven into the tapestry of the club over seven decades.  He was a consistent force for good at the club, even in dark times.  He will be greatly missed, and the thoughts of everyone at Chelsea FC are with his family and friends at this sad time,” Chelsea FC said in a statement.