Richard Gere has issued a tribute to his An Officer and a Gentleman costar Louis Gossett Jr., who simply died at age 87.
Within the movie, Gossett was Gunnery Sergeant Emil Foley, a drill teacher who formed Gere’s character Zack Mayo within the 1982 movie.
The movie earned Gossett an Academy Award for Finest Supporting Actor, the primary Black performer to win the Supporting Actor Oscar.
“He stayed in character the entire time,” Gere, 74, recalled in an announcement. “I don’t assume we ever noticed him socially. He was the drill sergeant 24-hours a day, and it confirmed clearly in his efficiency. He drove each scene he was in.”
Gere stated Gossett was “a tricky man with a coronary heart of gold,” including, “We have been all so pleased with him when he gained his Oscar.”
Director Taylor Hackford additionally issued an announcement that he “admired” Gossett’s stage work.
“Lou Gossett’s Sargent Foley might have been the primary Black character in American cinema to have absolute authority over white characters,” Hackford, 79, says. “The Academy acknowledged his consummate efficiency by voting him an Oscar for Finest Supporting Actor. He positively deserved it.”
Gossett’s character was initially “written as a White man,” however Hackford stated that modified after the director visited the Navy Officers Flight Coaching Middle in Pensacola, Fla., the place he discovered “most of the Drill Instructors there have been males of colour.”
“I discovered it attention-grabbing that Black & Brown enlisted males had ‘make-or-break’ management over whether or not white school graduates would grow to be officers and fighter pilots,” Hackford explains. “At that second I modified the casting profile for Sargent Foley and began assembly actors of colour.”