NEW YORK — Denis Arndt, a character actor and favorite of TV writer and producer David E. Kelley, getting cast in “L.A. Law,” “Picket Fences” and “Chicago Hope,” and later earning a Tony nomination for his Broadway debut at age 77 in a play about mismatched lovers, has died. He was 86.
Arndt died “peacefully in his bed” at his cabin home in Ashland, Oregon, his family announced in an obituary published March 26. It noted that he was born in 1939, the same year “The Wizard of Oz” came out.
“That was like Dad’s life,” it said. “It started out in black and white and blossomed into a life of color, brilliance, daring adventure and passion. And it was also a little bit trippy, like Oz.”
Arndt was a Vietnam veteran helicopter pilot who twice was awarded the Purple Heart and later flew helicopters in Alaska. He turned to acting after moving to Seattle, spending multiple seasons at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and performing as an early member of the Intiman Theatre in Seattle.
His career began in the mid-1980s with roles on the TV shows “Crime Story” and “Wiseguy,” and he would spend the 1990s in TV and film, with a highlight being one of the cops interrogating Sharon Stone’s character in Paul Verhoeven’s “Basic Instinct.”
Making his first and only Broadway appearance at age 77 opposite Mary-Louise Parker, Arndt received acclaim for his performance in “Heisenberg,” which debuted off-Broadway in 2015 before hitting Broadway a year later.
In the play by Simon Stephens, babble-mouthed 42-year-old Georgie from New Jersey randomly meets a bored 75-year-old Irish butcher, Alex, in a London train station and the two begin a strange courtship.
The Associated Press was charmed by the performers and Stephens’ play: “He captures new love and old love at the same time, hope and fear, the new world and the old. He’s turned the simplest of tales — boy meets girl — into an unexpectedly rich thing with just two chairs, two tables and two actors.”
On TV, Arndt was a frequent Kelly collaborator, starting with “L.A. Law” and then as lawyer Franklin Dell on “Picket Fences” over four seasons. He also had roles on “Chicago Hope,” “Ally McBeal,” “The Practice,” “Boston Public,” “Boston Legal” and “Mr. Mercedes.”
His other small-screen credits include “Providence, “The Wonder Years,” “Murder, She Wrote,” “Life Goes On,” “Herman’s Head,” “Touched by an Angel,” “Grey’s Anatomy” and “The Good Fight.”
He is survived by his wife, Magee, and his children, Scott, Tammy, Laurie, Kirsten, Bryce, McKenna and Tanner.
