Bill Cobbs, a legendary actor with over 50 years of experience in Hollywood, has passed away at 90 years old.
(Tim Boyles, Getty Images.)
Cobbs died Tuesday at his home in the Inland Empire, California, surrounded by family and friends, his publicist Chuck I. Jones said. Natural causes is the likely cause of death, Jones said. With an acting career spanning all the way back to the 1970s, Bill has nearly 200 movie and TV show credits to his name.
A native of Cleveland who excelled comedy and drama, Cobbs portrayed Whitney Houston’s manager in The Bodyguard (1992), the older brother of Medgar Evers in Rob Reiner’s Ghosts of Mississippi (1996), a jazz pianist in Tom Hanks’ That Thing You Do! (1996) and the Master Tinker, builder of the Tin Woodsman, in Sam Raimi’s Oz the Great and Powerful (2013).
Bill also played Arthur Chaney in 1997's "Air Bud." He made his feature film debut in 1974 with a part in "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three." His TV credits include a recurring role as Lewis Coleman on I'll Fly Away in the early nineties. He made guest appearances on Walker, Texas Ranger and The Sopranos just to name a few. Bill also won a Daytime Emmy Award, taking home the hardware for Outstanding Limited Performance in a Daytime Program for his work on the kids show Dino Dana.
(Leon Bennet, WireImage.)
Born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio, Bill served in the Air Force for 8 years and worked at IBM and as a car salesman before relocating to New York to find work as an actor. He also acted in theater productions and played the drums.
He had just reached the milestone birthday on June 16th, and his brother Thomas Cobbs’ post said the whole family was able to celebrate with him ... calling Bill a "beloved partner, big brother, uncle, surrogate parent, godfather and friend."
Thomas told TMZ Bill was recently battling pneumonia, which is the suspected cause of death.
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