Legendary actor and Mississippi native James Earl Jones has passed away at the age of 93, his family confirmed on Monday afternoon.
Going on to be known as the voice of Darth Vader in “Star Wars” and roles in an innumerable list of movies that also included “The Lion King” and “Field of Dreams,” Jones was born in Arkabutla on Jan. 17, 1931, before moving with his family to Michigan as part of the Great Migration. He famously battled a severe stutter as a child but overcame it and eventually turned into one of the most recognizable voices in all of Hollywood.
“People would come to the house, and there’d be introductions made and I couldn’t introduce myself,” he told PBS in 2014. “I found it was, oh, so good sometimes because silence isn’t bad. It’s good to listen. And I learned to listen.”
The stutter motivated Jones to pursue acting after a high school teacher used poetry to help him not only end his periods of silence but speak more clearly. After college and serving in the U.S. Army, Jones began acting in various plays throughout Michigan before making it big on Broadway.
As Jones garnered acclaim on the theatre scene, he was simultaneously beginning his career on TV. The eventual Emmy Award winner got his start on the screen with “East Side/West Side” in the 1960s. By 1974, he had transitioned to film with his first co-star role coming in “Claudine,” a movie that was the first of its kind to address racial disparities Black families in America face. Three years later, in 1977, he made his debut in the iconic voiceover role of Darth Vader.
Jones received two Primetime Emmy Awards in 1991, one for Best Supporting Actor for his work in “Heat Wave” and the other for Best Actor for “Gabriel’s Fire.” He also won a Daytime Emmy for the children’s special “Summer’s End” in 2000. Other awards Jones picked up along the way were two Tony Awards, a Grammy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Honorary Award.
Jones died on Monday morning, surrounded by family inside his Dutchess County, N.Y., home. The cause was not immediately clear.
