Posts: 48654 From: Houston, TX Registered: Nov 1999
posted 05-13-2022 12:58 PM
Fred Ward, who portrayed astronaut Gus Grissom in the 1983 feature film "The Right Stuff," died on May 8, 2022. He was 79.
Ward brought his trademark grit to his portrayal of the courageous, intelligent astronaut Gus Grissom in 1983's "The Right Stuff," Philip Kaufman's epic story of the early space program. Perhaps because Grissom ultimately lost his life in service to NASA (he was command pilot on Apollo 1, but before its launch on Feb. 21, 1967, the command module interior caught fire and all three men aboard died), audiences were especially sensitive to the portrayal in "The Right Stuff."
The film chronicled the Project Mercury spacecraft incident in which the emergency explosive bolts fired after splashdown and blew the hatch off, causing the ship to flood. A NASA investigation cleared Grissom of blame in the incident, but the way it was portrayed in "The Right Stuff" suggested that Ward's Grissom had panicked and fired the explosive bolts as a result.
GACspaceguy Member
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stsmithva Member
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posted 05-13-2022 04:35 PM
I will add that he was great in "Tremors", "The Player", and a movie I enjoyed ridiculously much in high school, "Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins."
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