Donald Sutherland, Iconic Actor of ‘M.A.S.H.’ and ‘Hunger Games,’ Passes Away at 88

Born in St. John, New Brunswick, Donald McNichol Sutherland was the son of a salesman and a mathematics teacher. Raised in Nova Scotia, he was a disc jockey with his own radio station at age 14.

“When I was 13 or 14, I really thought everything I felt was wrong and dangerous, and that God was going to kill me for it,” Sutherland told The New York Times in 1981. “My father always said, ‘Keep your mouth shut, Donnie, and maybe people will think you have character.’”

Sutherland began as an engineering student at the University of Toronto but switched to English and started acting in school theatrical productions. While studying, he met Lois Hardwick, an aspiring actress. They married in 1959 but divorced seven years later.

After graduating in 1956, Sutherland attended the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art to study acting. He began appearing in West End plays and British television. After a move to Los Angeles, a series of war films changed his trajectory.

His breakthrough was “The Dirty Dozen” (1967), in which he played Vernon Pinkley, the officer-impersonating psychopath. 1970 saw the release of the World War II yarn “Kelly’s Heroes” and “M.A.S.H.,” a smash hit that catapulted Sutherland to stardom.

“There is more challenge in character roles,” Sutherland told The Washington Post in 1970. “There’s longevity. A good character actor can show a different face in every film and not bore the public.”

If Sutherland had had his way, Altman would have been fired from “M.A.S.H.” He was unhappy with the director’s unorthodox, improvisational style. But the film caught on beyond anyone’s expectations.

Sutherland identified with its anti-war message. Outspoken against the Vietnam War, he along with actress Jane Fonda and others founded the Free Theater Associates in 1971. Banned by the Army because of their political views, they performed in venues near military bases in Southeast Asia in 1973.

“I thought I was going to be part of a revolution that was going to change movies and its influence on people,” Sutherland told the Los Angeles Times.

His career as a leading man peaked in the 1970s, when he starred in films by the era’s top directors — even if they didn’t always do their best work with him. Sutherland, who frequently said he considered himself at the service of a director’s vision, worked with Federico Fellini (1976’s “Fellini’s Casanova”), Bernardo Bertolucci (1976’s “1900″), Claude Chabrol (1978’s “Blood Relatives”) and John Schlesinger (1975’s “The Day of the Locust”).

One of his finest performances came as a detective in Alan Pakula’s “Klute” (1971). During filming he met Fonda, with whom he had a three-year relationship that began at the end of his second marriage to actor Shirley Douglas. He and Douglas divorced in 1971 after having twins: Rachel and Kiefer, who was named after Warren Kiefer, the writer of Sutherland’s first film, “Castle of the Living Dead.”

Nicolas Roeg’s psychological horror film “Don’t Look Now” (1973) was another high point. Sutherland starred with Julie Christie as a grieving couple who move to Venice after their daughter’s death. The film included a famous, explicit sex scene, artfully edited.