Donald Sutherland, the Canadian actor known to younger generations as President Snow in the Hunger Games franchise, has died. Sutherland’s son, Kiefer, posted the news on X on June 20. He was 88.
In addition to Hunger Games, Sutherland had nearly 200 screen and television credits in his 6-decade career, including M*A*S*H (the 1970 film that served as the basis of the television series), Animal House, Ordinary People, JFK, the 2003 remake of the Italian Job, and Pride and Prejudice.
Despite his high acclaim as an actor, Sutherland was never nominated for an Academy Award.
Donald McNichol Sutherland was born July 17, 1935, in Saint John, New Brunswick. His first foray into show business was as a news reader at a Bridgewater, New Brunswick radio station when he was 14. He studied at Victoria University in Toronto before continuing his studies at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art.
Sutherland played bit parts and cameos in the UK in the early 1960s, when he was cast in 1967’s The Dirty Dozen. That breakthrough role led him to Hollywood and the lead role as “Hawkeye” Pierce in M*A*S*H. Over his career, Sutherland played varied roles in comedies such as Animal House and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, to dramas such as Ordinary People, and even horrors like Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
Although he never received an Academy Award nomination, in 2017 Sutherland received an Honorary Oscar “for a lifetime of indelible characters, rendered with unwavering truthfulness”. He also received two Golden Globes: in 1996 for his supporting role in Citizen X—for which he was also awarded an Emmy—and for the HBO film Path to War in 2003.
Sutherland was married three times, including to Shirley Douglas, the daughter of the founder of Canada’s universal health care system and Premier of Saskatchewan Tommy Douglas. He had five children: Kiefer and Rachel with Douglas, and Rossif, Angus, and Roeg from his third marriage to Québécoise actress Francine Racette.
