'Command & Conquer 'Actor Gene Dynarski Has Sadly Passed Away
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Actor Eugene 'Gene' Dynarski has sadly died at 86. Perhaps best known among gamers as Joseph Stalin in Command & Conquer: Red Alert, Dynarski enjoyed a prolific career that spanned stage and screen. You might also remember him from roles in Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Star Trek, and Seinfeld.
The news was broken playwright and friend Ernest Kearney, who confirmed earlier this week that Dynarski passed away while recuperating from a "heart episode" he suffered earlier in the year. He's survived by his two children.
In a touching tribute to Dynarski written by Kearney, the playwright recalled that his friend had a "genius" for p*ssing off the one wrong people. "Generally, the very last people whom an actor in Hollywood should piss off." To illustrate his point, Kearney remembered a time that Dynarski supposedly got on the wrong side of Steven Spielberg himself - not something any actor would want to do, I imagine.
"He p*ssed off Spielberg," Kearney claimed. "P*ssed him off to the point where, after its 1977 debut, Spielberg cut Dynarski out of all [Close Encounters] subsequent releases. It wasn't until the release of the 30th Anniversary Ultimate Edition that included the 1977 edition that Dynarski's performance could be seen again."
Still, Dynarski would always turn in "superb performances", even if he still generally managed to "put himself on the wrong side of people," Kearney added. He also concluded that despite his "abrasive and harsh diatribes," Dynarski was ultimately a generous and kindhearted man who was "hard to stay p*ssed at"
According to Kearney's tribute (and I really recommend you read the whole thing), Dynarski was born to Polish immigrants in New York. He lied about his age to join the Navy at the tender age of 16, before moving to California in 1957 to begin his career in acting. By all accounts, it seems he lived a fascinating life. His role in a beloved 1996 RTS game is very much the tip of the iceberg.
A remaster of Command & Conquer: Red Alert will be releasing for PC on June 5th. We know that EA wants to keep the game as authentic and true to the original as possible, and have worked to enhance and remaster number of the original FMV scenes. Hopefully Dynarski's performance is among those old tapes, so that a whole new generation can see him in action.
