Actor Clarence Gilyard Jr., maybe greatest identified for his butt-kicking lawman reverse Chuck Norris on TV’s “Walker, Texas Ranger,” has died at age 66.
Gilyard was just lately a movie and theater professor on the University of Nevada Las Vegas’ College of Fine Arts, which announced his death Monday. The college didn’t present particulars.
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“His students were deeply inspired by him, as were all who knew him,” Dean Nancy J. Uscher mentioned on Instagram. “He had many extraordinary talents and was extremely well-known in the university through his dedication to teaching and his professional accomplishments.”
Gilyard additionally made a reputation for himself as non-public investigator Conrad McMasters on 85 episodes of “Matlock” (1989-93) In a getTV interview, he credited the present’s star, Andy Griffith, for serving to him develop comedian chops.
Gilyard made his main movie debut in “Top Gun” (1986), which led to a meetup with producer Joel Silver to play the unhealthy man laptop whiz Theo in “Die Hard” (1989), the performer recalled to an NPR affiliate.
“They’d been looking for me. This is like out of a dream,” he mentioned.
Playing the position of a terrorist was “so far outside the box for a young African-American, you know what I mean, to be offered this,” he mentioned.
But Gilyard’s calling card was to be Ranger James Trivette from 1993 to 2001 on “Walker, Texas Ranger.”
Gilyard informed GetTV he was about to signal with CBS for a pilot of his personal however established motion star Norris had made a take care of the community for 13 episodes of “Walker.” “Thirteen checks versus one check” and Gilyard’s earlier martial arts and rodeo expertise made him a pure for the position, he mentioned.
“And because I knew all my competition in town, it was pretty obvious that I was really the only person that could fit that character,” the Moses Lake, Washington, native mentioned. “You need to fit a character in a television series.”
Here’s the scene during which he meets Norris’s Cordell Walker:
Gilyard married twice, Variety reported, and reportedly had six kids.
