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erwin van den heuvel
Van IMDB:
Actor John Spencer Dies at 58
Actor John Spencer, who won an Emmy award for playing chief of staff Leo McGarry on The West Wing, died Friday of a heart attack; he was 58. Spencer's publicist, Ron Hoffman, said that Spencer died at a Los Angeles hospital, and no further details were available at press time. Born in New York to a lower middle-class family, Spencer began his acting career in 1963 with a recurring role on The Patty Duke Show; stage work throughout the country followed, and he earned an Obie award for the Vietnam veteran drama Still Life. Spencer didn't really become known to a wide audience until the mid-80s, though, when a number of character parts in both film and television led to a regular role in the hit series LA Law. His role as tough New York attorney Tommy Mullaney, who was a transplant to Los Angeles, spanned a four-year run, and roles in a number of television movies and feature films (including Cop Land, The Rock, and The Negotiator) followed. But it was The West Wing, which launched in 1999, that brought Spencer his most memorable role, as well as a number of Emmy nominations, five in all; he won the Best Supporting Actor award in 2002. Like his character, Leo McGarry, Spencer was also an alcoholic as well as a self-proclaimed workaholic, and used his own experiences to illuminate Leo's personal and professional lives. Recently, his character (who suffered a heart attack on the show) was tapped as the vice-presidential candidate to Jimmy Smits' presidential contender Matt Santos. Services and funeral arrangements are currently pending. --Prepared by IMDb staff