In this Feb. 25, 1963 file photo, actor Cliff Robertson takes a break as the skipper of the PT 109, Lt. John F. Kennedy in the movie "PT 109." Robertson died Saturday, Sept. 10, 2011. He was 88. AP PHOTO
NEW YORK – Cliff Robertson, the handsome movie actor who played John F. Kennedy in “PT-109,” won an Oscar for “Charly” and was famously victimized in a 1977 Hollywood forgery scandal, has died. He was 88.
His secretary of 53 years, Evelyn Christel, said he died Saturday afternoon in Stony Brook, New York, of natural causes.
Robertson never rose into the top ranks of leading men, but he remained a popular actor from the mid-1950s into the following century. His later roles included kindly Uncle Ben in the “Spider-Man” movies.
His triumph came in 1968 with his Academy Award performance in “Charly,” as a mentally disabled man who undergoes medical treatment that makes him a genius — until a poignant regression to his former state.
His funeral is set for Friday.